How To Dream
Pop your eyeballs
out your head
put ‘em in a jar
leave to soak overnight
plain water will bring you
plain dreams
shopping malls
and one-way traffic
but mix in crystal meth
coke or smack
you’ll dream wild
spaghetti roads
pulling you down
into the dish
‘course you have to wake up
grow up
but pop those eyes
back into your head
come morning or night
whatever your shift
and you’ll see a world
even duller than the one
from the day before
when you couldn’t wait to get home
pop your eyeballs in a jar
and dream
Joey Boy
The arsehole
at the end of the world
is here under the M6
waiting to be carved
from a concrete underflow
that was as soft as semen
in 1963
when Joey crossed
the wrong deal
or screwed the wrong hole
and was sent down here
to sleep away his dreams
in a bed warmed with concrete
and softened with piss
until the city shakes him loose
like a dice in a fist
and he arises in the thirty-third century
arsehole first
and god-like they say
to spit out the light
of the sun.
Doubled Up
Been digging shit
from my own ass for so long
it’s a shock to be here
on the tide-line, not stranded
or washed-up, or feeling like
nails have been hammered
in my head. Four days bail
is four days free, a homeless man
waking up feeling well-fed.
Almost a shock to remember
that life doesn’t have to go
that sad old way; the un-natural
jerk at six a.m, lifetimes lost
lifting telephones and tapping dead keys
folded away like a letter
in my pocket I’m in no real hurry
to read. So is this how it’s supposed
to be, or is this just how it is?
No rapture or judgement
will settle the score or pick up
the tab, I’ll just live what’s left
to life and suffer the rest
like an old drunk waking up
in a ditch with a hangover
the size of a car tyre hosanna’d
round his neck, telling himself
that four days can un-roll
like a sleeping bag whenever
he needs rest - though I know
they’ll feel more like an engine
lugged round on my back
when the alarm kicks me out
on Tuesday morning:
a four-day sentence
till Saturday breaks cover
and I imagine I’m free again.
Epiphany
I’ve flirted with God
for fifty years
but we’ve never gone steady
or even held hands,
just longed across the street
like hooker and john
wondering which one
needs the other the most,
finding with sadness
maybe relief
that we both need to walk away.
20mg
Pancaked today;
flat as a wind
that bends the grass
but doesn’t touch
the trees. They’re fine
up there, facing their green heads
into a camera
whose exposure is so long
only the absent camera-man
will see the final picture
and wonder at the tapeworm
worming its way
through the long grass
on 20mg a day.
Pop your eyeballs
out your head
put ‘em in a jar
leave to soak overnight
plain water will bring you
plain dreams
shopping malls
and one-way traffic
but mix in crystal meth
coke or smack
you’ll dream wild
spaghetti roads
pulling you down
into the dish
‘course you have to wake up
grow up
but pop those eyes
back into your head
come morning or night
whatever your shift
and you’ll see a world
even duller than the one
from the day before
when you couldn’t wait to get home
pop your eyeballs in a jar
and dream
Joey Boy
The arsehole
at the end of the world
is here under the M6
waiting to be carved
from a concrete underflow
that was as soft as semen
in 1963
when Joey crossed
the wrong deal
or screwed the wrong hole
and was sent down here
to sleep away his dreams
in a bed warmed with concrete
and softened with piss
until the city shakes him loose
like a dice in a fist
and he arises in the thirty-third century
arsehole first
and god-like they say
to spit out the light
of the sun.
Doubled Up
Been digging shit
from my own ass for so long
it’s a shock to be here
on the tide-line, not stranded
or washed-up, or feeling like
nails have been hammered
in my head. Four days bail
is four days free, a homeless man
waking up feeling well-fed.
Almost a shock to remember
that life doesn’t have to go
that sad old way; the un-natural
jerk at six a.m, lifetimes lost
lifting telephones and tapping dead keys
folded away like a letter
in my pocket I’m in no real hurry
to read. So is this how it’s supposed
to be, or is this just how it is?
No rapture or judgement
will settle the score or pick up
the tab, I’ll just live what’s left
to life and suffer the rest
like an old drunk waking up
in a ditch with a hangover
the size of a car tyre hosanna’d
round his neck, telling himself
that four days can un-roll
like a sleeping bag whenever
he needs rest - though I know
they’ll feel more like an engine
lugged round on my back
when the alarm kicks me out
on Tuesday morning:
a four-day sentence
till Saturday breaks cover
and I imagine I’m free again.
Epiphany
I’ve flirted with God
for fifty years
but we’ve never gone steady
or even held hands,
just longed across the street
like hooker and john
wondering which one
needs the other the most,
finding with sadness
maybe relief
that we both need to walk away.
20mg
Pancaked today;
flat as a wind
that bends the grass
but doesn’t touch
the trees. They’re fine
up there, facing their green heads
into a camera
whose exposure is so long
only the absent camera-man
will see the final picture
and wonder at the tapeworm
worming its way
through the long grass
on 20mg a day.
