Category Archives: Writing

A collection of everything

UrNotMe

The trouble is you never want to see it my way
You always want to have it your way
like a broken down record you’re stuck in the past
skipping and scratching along Old 55s highway.
you asked me to be your crutch
and then you left me in the lurch
you asked me to be your guide
but you never acted such.
You dealt drinks like a croupie
smiles like a film star
but now that I know you
I can only say this:
Your heart holds nothing but that you wanted it that way.
The pain that you’ve chosen you designed all anyway.
It may be you lost control
It may be you’re in a hole
But the fingering of records of our past
will not make the moments last
but the delving into the stream
will not reverse this dream.
And you might well call it a nightmare
you might even shout traitor
you might even be right when I never tried to save you.
But it was never about me, but you,
and what I could bring along.
It was never about us two
but whether I would sing your song.
And from a distance I read about the pain
and when I returned I experienced it again.
but I was no longer convinced,
I was no longer so sure
if the friend I once had
was my friend anymore.
And when you held me in contempt
I swore I could never forgive you,
but I did.
Your number erased from my phone
came back all by itself.
I remember the gig where we took to the floor
spooking all the natives into the shadows.
And it all could have been good,
it all could have worked,
but instead I had to fight them off as they dragged you out the back door.
Instead I had to bleed while you escaped once more.
Instead the one who’d caused the pain was the one to suffer the least all over again.
Instead the ones around you wilting were held dear
and I just stood there,
I just stood there.

©TheHairyTeacher2013

Balcony

On the morning balcony
the pine tree guard looming all round
at the outpost of my vision on his perch
the dawn patrol is headed by this silhouette
somewhere far off his follwers respond
a chorus of recognition
nearby some jackdaws squabble over pittens
their squawks and chatter no less meaningful
a fly, persistent, buzzes by
and almost unrelenting before he moves off
the garden in the cooling shade
already feels the pending heat
the air moves sluggishly:
another hot day’s coming.

©TheHairyTeacher2013

Friday left longing

On a grey May day
beyond the storm for now
in the lurking mucky derivative
we march forth.
The flashes of the night
the fork, the sheet
the rumble, clatter, bang
scaring up the ghosts of primitive man.
I would have made my god right then
exposed within the horrid beauty
but instead I swaddled in progression.
The morning brought the picture
the saturation
and the birds in fury screamed their prolonged existence.
The storm had passed, a new day come.

©TheHairyTeacher2013

I’m half hating it?

I’m half hating it?

I’m loving it or I’m hating it? I’m not sure cos, for starters, I’m not even sure where to begin! The fact that I seem, semantically, to be answering a question suggests that I have recognised the statement form above as question: rendered, as it is, intonationally in the spoken form. I learnt or learned this, though I do not profess myself the learned man, in a random French class of my youth. As it happens, my odd-Catholic mother ( odd because she adheres to the practice while not believing in shit) furthered my education when, one day, I proclaimed I had French letters in my bag. Ah, but that is, as they say, scéal eile!
Returning to another point I’m not even sure I’ve made yet: I’m loving it. Taught as incorrect by desperate ( panicky rather than terrible) EFL, or other acronymical, teachers everywhere because of those damn stative verbs and yet more recently contradicted by Ronald and his cronies, I do now have to add my 50 Cents(!), or tuppence or 5 forint or whatever.
Those who teach languages as rule-based risk being discredited by popular culture. Those who don’t risk unnerving their students. I, however, have just this to say:

and because Otis said it, I believe it, and… A. that’s that! B. that’s fuckin’ well that!
Your choice. My opinion;)

©TheHairyTeacher2013

Frythem

Freedom fries freedom lies
fear the malice in their eyes.
Free the prisoners of their war
and let’s not wonder anymore.
Freedom lives and freedom dies
beneath the flag borne at our side.
The drummer boy rat-tat-a-tat
dressed to the nines
dies in the dirt.
Freedom won with many lives
the coffin/casket, another shackle.
Freedom thrives in many minds
but on our hands just blood we’ll find.

 

©TheHairyTeacher2013

The fated fly

The fated fly

We’re all born to die…he said

we’re all born to die.

We’re not born to live…he screamed

we’re not born to live!

But live we shall until we die

and live we shall until that time

But we’re not born to live…proclaimed

he who’d had his time.

We’re all born to live…she said

we’re all born to live

and to another life we’ll give…she said

and another then shall live

and when death has gripped then …she said

when death has asked its toll

then we’ll have lived a life…she said

a life that had grown old.

We’re all born to die…he cried

and the tears ran from his eyes

we’re all born to live…she smiled

as she took from him his life.

 

©TheHairyTeacher2013

The storm

The storm

In the stickiness under roof

the slate designed covering-

trapped short, the air, my breath, the heat,

all building before the storm.

And then it broke so gently at first,

almost hesitant, but darkening.

And with flash and bang and full cloud burst,

with each roll and fork then worsening.

The water layered to measured height,

the wet ground come a pool.

And we protected by what now seemed slight,

as the streams searched for our stool.

But finally, last gasp, last chance,

the rain itself eased off,

and though the storm held its brooding dance –

the worst passed – we all felt safe.

So out like brave, spright, troubadours,

we frolicked through the pools.

Relief that there would be no more…

yet uncertain, or we’d be fools.

 

©TheHairyTeacher2013

The Horror

The Horror

The pleasant day expressed

in the smiles of passengers.

Babes asleep, breasts all pert,

the Spring-time thickening.

The on and off from stop to stop

I smile inside – it’s life.

But what bitterness has brought me to this juncture,

where I peel back the pleasantries

and vent again, once more:

the words contorted – I am afraid

for I’ve had dreams

of which I cannot speak.

 

©TheHairyTeacher2013

The Black Fume

The Black Fume

Degree drops from

The digital display.

Once as hot as hell

Now unbearably less.

There is a coolness

For the damned.

In the soft yellow-orange of sunset,

There may yet be respite.

For the meek there

Is nothing, not till

The very end.

They don’t shelter

In the glory of shadows

And the rising and the setting

of all things celestial.

Their wait is longer –

Bound in time,

If legitimate,

But maybe not their lifetime,

And therefore,

They may never know.

“If I die into nothing

I will forever remain ignorant,

Unknowing as to

My own fate.”

Amen

[And this will be the only true infinity. Timeless. Unbound. Nothing!]

 

©TheHairyTeacher2013

No Distance

No Distance

I cannot leave behind what I have not forsaken

And so it is, that

While the distance grows most physical

I’ll be by you

As you by me

Our hearts not tempered

By the sheer

Logic

And bitterness

Of other people’s

Fears!

 

©TheHairyTeacher2013

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