The Vacant Lot

The empty space
Where my hand falls
The room to spreadeagle
Tormenting
The hollow room
Unwelcome echoes
The door snatched open
By invisible hands
When the darkness subsides
And still alone
It’s the hope that nurtures
The light that leads
The meal for two
Once lasted for days
Disappearing quite suddenly
In a drunken haze
And yet it’s those places frequented
Now passed by in shame
Not wanting to be recognized
Nor needing to explain
They steal away
A chance at humanity
A chance at the high life
Or some other taint
The streets once strolled down
Hand within hand
The nights loosely forgotten
Now etched – infinite
And yet even still
Intellectualising
Trying to paint pain
The stuffed toy on the mantle
Levelling that façade
Until again in the darkness
That primordial glitch
Where the veneer of bravery
Shattered – in bits


© The Hairy Teacher, Augusztus 19, 2020 (21:49, Fasor aka Jason)

The dream family

I introduced you last night
You and your brother-
Or your cousin…
Right now I can’t remember,
And I’m trying not to care-
As if somethings are more important.
Last night I shook your hand
And whoever else’s-
As I introduced you-
But to whom?
Even now I wonder if
In reality
Family can be less elusive,
As they seem in dreams:
As ours was not to be?
Was this the real reason for the division?
Or do some couples grow apart,
Not from each other
But all others
And the things they once enjoyed?
I enjoy my life
Yet see the distance
Closeness can create:
Delving into the dream of those who matter
The foundations finally falter
The façade ripped off exposing
The shallow lives we have led.
Maybe it’s just fear
Avoiding company with excuses
But beneath all notions
Perhaps therein lies
Pain, fear, uncertainty.
Perhaps for everyone –
And perhaps across the void
As our hands reached out
Mine asleep, yours eternally,
I only understood
Base wishes;
The truth
The distance
Shall remain.

© The Hairy Teacher, 22nd July, 2020

To Joe

Last night
Or this morning a’round dawn
A thought
Wandered in on its own
Twas an idea
Of who you once were
The stories
Regaling us all
The devil
Residing in you
No different
To the ones in us too
And this morning
Or last night Or whenever
You returned
From that place of forever
And I lent
You an ear, or mind’s eye
Leaving
A vision of horror subside
Realising
Just how much I cared
Surprised
Yet not drawn to tears
Tony

missing you as he will
Honestly
I think of you still.

© The Hairy Teacher, 28th July, 2020

Dias del Dinero

The subtle thoughts

The Day of the Dead

The loss made image in a prayer.

The flower stall blooming

And business is booming

But ONLY Halloween is unfair.

The gravity of the moment

More grave with every plot

Stepping over friend and family

And the stranger that time forgot.

The Day of the Dead

When all become saints

Beneath a tumble of well wishes and thoughts

When all axes well ground

Are buried with hope

That all grudges in the end become nought.

And that one day in our due

we’ll avoid being forgotten too;

Not left to dwell in a stoney silence

Hidden by time and grass

Removed from a construct

We like to call the past.

© The Hairy Teacher, November 2006 (revised May 31, 2020)

Margit’s Bridge

The erratic heartbeat of the city

As rubber padded thunk moves level

Carhorns join in melody

The rush hour music playing strong.

The hum, the purr, the growl of engines

Darkness descended, the beast’s upended

To prowl in search of life outside

The daily click clack,

The daily grind.

And on in bursts of ebb and flow

Below the Danube creeps past slow

A moon appears to offer light

But not tonight… Not tonight.

Illuminating city streets

Arising from the shadows creep

There is no need for stars tonight,

Fluorescence is the guiding light.

And deeper, darker, into the hollow

Blending with the nighttime cheer

The beast appears to disappear

Appearing once again tomorrow.

© The Hairy Teacher, December 2006, (revised May 31st, 2020)

Once upon a time in Arranmore

Once upon a time in Arranmore

Pat, Auntie Pat

Both the plaintive moan and tell tale tattler

to myself and Killian’s attempts to flee for a fag by the wayside.

The spy in our midst, at once our traitor and our watch dog bred.

No chance to escape his torment, we suffered him in silence.

Or at least in muttered curses themselves by the wayside fled.

Pat, Auntie Pat

The, at once childish, though distinctly cunning, call to arms of all attention

His will to have us be undone and yet not knowing, even then –

The true power of addiction, the urge which must be answered.

We slipped his noose from time to time but his nose thereafter sharper

Calling attention to our scent, “like old men in a pub” –

the crusty beard-stained-yellow troubadours of hapless pints and memory.

Pat, Auntie Pat

And so the buoyancy of teenage prattle was exposed,

to blushes forth the information that in secret had been cast.

Not to be trusted evermore

The boy to arms alone like many times before

A schoolyard had dared to bully but he bit back

And so he disappeared from out that car and on into his only life

Till time and distance solidified but a memory

Till one cruel Sunday morning and his life cut short

Pat, Auntie Pat

The echo of a time forever more.

© The Hairy Teacher, (October 3, 2016), Revised April 13, 2020.

A Place Called Grange

A Place Called Grange

Through the veil of a vague remembrance
something tries to shine distinctly
Something claims the honour of
being remembered beyond the pale.
And whether truth or wishful thinking
it vies for recognition
And whether relevant to a fact
it remains relevant to us all.
It is not the collective notion
of a notion of our past
Nor the romanticised rebellion
in delusion against the truth
It is rather just a memory
mixed and mattered by circumstance
For it is our pain and how
we each deal with it in the end.

© The Hairy Teacher, April 12 (Easter Sunday), 2020

Planned to be sent

Planned to be sent

I’ve decided to write this letter on paper just because, in the face of redundancy, I think all things should get at least one last appeal, and here within the artform that is letter writing, once an actual means of basic communication, be it humble or great, I have found need to defend the very form itself. It is dying so they say because of what? Our sense of urgency, our brevity or is it perhaps because little utterances conveyed too often form the emalgamated whale that swallows all sea life, including the beauty that would convey at least dramatically but a slice of all life? In sheer verbosity through quantity of snippets we have served up execution to the draft and thought, to the long evenings delivered into the arms of wonder as we delve, in search of expression, vying with every pen to paper push, a sinewy pleasure, for the perfection which, as writers we should always fear eludes us, for it must, and without attaining that spectacle of greatness, further purpose to ourselves that fair dangled destiny, that truest of beauties, the fatal enterprise, forever flawed for such is its nature.

Like I Said

Any confidence displayed
Is fobbed off as arrogance
Any voice I choose
A bitter fallacy
And to speak too loud
Akin to sinfulness
Any display of joy
Just seen as selfishness.
Any mention of my pain
Just insignificant
Because I can’t suffer
Cos that too’s just silliness.
And when we’ve talked our anger through and shaken hands
It doesn’t matter cos with time and choice forgetfulness
The whole thing just resets and needs must we start again.

© The Hairy Teacher, Friday 13th December, 2019

My Death Reflected

I have seen my corpse.
I saw it today
Reflecting back at me
As I stared out
Into the darkness.
It wore the ashen
Grey bone mix
Almost regal against the night, the rain,
And the glass window pane.
I have seen my corpse
I saw it today
Not prostrate to the tempting tomb
But erect
And rigid
Almost alive-
And it peered at me
Through darkened eyes
Down all my days
And I surrendered.
I have seen my corpse
I saw it today
And it told me of my future
And not some dainty priestly tale
Of death nor immortality-
It showed me all the treasures
In its ragged decomposing,
The leathered skin
In binding me
My winding sheet becoming.

© The Hairy Teacher, November 15, 2019

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