ADHD - Bin Bags

​I sailed from Exmouth to Durham for supplies,

anchoring near a café off the high street - for bin bags.

Bin bags  - ​I was meant to get bin bags! 

I initially went so as I could drop that parcel ashore

to a cove somewhere 

somewhere between the mustard and the bread - but I forgot!

I forgot the bin bags!

It was that old salt 'Geordie' who said I was to sail to Durham,

and then sand entered my head

blown up along the seafront.

Sand. 

Which sand? 

What?

Sand?

Which..?

Sandwiches!

I forgot to wrap the sandwiches

before I stowed the cling-film below deck.

​The waves like meringues

brought the cream ashore, 

but what of the rest of my list?

I must store those bin bags, 

I must do the recycling,

clear the decks,

or those meringues;

like the waves 

are going to be history!

But look at those fence panels - sea defences toppled by the gales,

bubbles in the wind,

like...

Wait, bubbles!

Did I finish the washing up?

​Why am I holding my wallet? 

...bin bags - I need to get bin bags!

Wait - or was it chocolate? 

No bin bags!

​How could I forget?

I was moored up alongside the shop after all!

​aground -  like a yacht caught in a whirlpool

I’m standing in the kitchen with a tiller in my hand,

wondering why the lock gates were open,

and why I have my oil-skins on!

Where I’m supposed to be? 

Oh! - the shop!

...and bin bags!

Truth

Truth used to be a mountain -

elevated, 

singularly massive

something you could climb, stand upon

and from which you could see everything; clearly.

Not now.

​Now it is all smoke and mirrors

a fantasy built from pixels and electrical pulses.

It is whatever shape you wish it!

The press deals with truth through a combination of rigorous

ethics-driven reporting,

and conversely,

through methods influenced by commercial, 

political, 

and at times, 

sensationalist pressures.

Sometimes with a guided purpose,

other times caught up in the storm of coming first - where accuracy is the tax paid!

​On glowing screens which,

in our homes,

illuminate our evening faces,

the broadcast voices

dress in the costume of certainty

speaking in bold fonts and primary colours,

carving the world into them and us

'til the middle ground resembles a ghost town

leaving the facts to dress as mere ornaments.

​Then comes the mobile tidal wave!

A billion voices,

shouting in their echoy cathedral of choice.

Their chosen algorithms - the silent librarians,

whisper only what they want you to hear,

building digital rooms without windows

where those echos sound like an anthem.

​And off stage to the left - an AI chuckles to itself,

the mirror that has learned to dream,

creating the 'almost-real'

from the threads of everything we have ever said!

Something that doesn't know the taste of an apple,

only the maths behind the word 'juicy'.

​Truth hasn't vanished

it has just been shattered into a trillion pieces!

It no longer waits to be found,

it is the 'Ikea' flat-pack

delivered; to be assembled 

piece, 

by jagged piece,

with a steady hand 

...and with a skeptical eye!

Graffiti Crime

The council came and painted over

graffiti that'd been applied

all along the station footbridge

across the buildings; there outside.

The council created blocks of colour 

where the graffiti used to be

painting over political slurs 

so we could; no longer see

...then a thought 

     caught me short...

Painting over all that graffiti 

hiding a minor irritation 

now; isn't my local council 

creating a graffiti violation!

January - Dear Diary

Dear diary.

It's now the 65th day of January.

I'm going deaf in my left eye

and have just finished eating the last page of the Christmas Radio Times - I ran out of mince pies 3 days ago.

I saw the last packet of 'Christmas Brie' walk out of the backdoor yesterday,

saying it had had enough - so food supplies are running low!

I am managing to stay warm by

burning the endless supply of holiday brochures coming through my letterbox - most of them are for summer 2028 anyway!

I am now wishing I'd bought more Easter eggs before Christmas.

The five trays of clotted cream I bought have been useful. 

I've been using it to block up the draughts coming in through the gaps around the windows.

Moral is low.

I've now watched the 'Morecambe and Wise Christmas Special' for the 32nd time

and am keeping myself cheery by thinking of what I will do when my next pay cheque arrives - I believe it's due in around 8 months time!

I managed to pick up a weak and crackly signal from the BBC on my wireless set.

The announcer said something about the spring being just around the corner - I think that means three years away!

I am hoping the world is still out there.

I haven't opened the curtains for at least six months!

At least all this rain is filling up the reservoirs...

but wait,

what was that?

Was that the gales rattling the letterbox flap again,

blowing yet more snow against my windows,

piling it up against my front door,

or was it the doorbell?

...ah yes,

it was the doorbell,

it was the brave 'postie' in his shorts and T-shirt,

with my electricity bill,

my water bill,

and my council tax demand...

...oh and some more 2028 holiday brochures!

I think they'll all burn well!

I See Way

I see things way in a 

things that don't you see

Things might that - you confuse 

Tend to make sense more to me.

Perhaps incorrectly up I'm wired

Perhaps wrong circuitry is my!

I all know 

what I is sense

I have nothing to else go by!

If The Shoe Fits

Moonlight shone; as

silver spoons glance

at shoes performing

the perfect dance

sandwiches fly high

through buttery clouds,

frogs wearing neckties,

welcomed the crowds.

Doves circle; skirts

take the air!

Waltzing the ballroom 

without a care!

​Raindrops end celebrations

glass carriages; glitz!

Dark - countryside; if

the shoe fits.

​

What Are You AI?

I asked an AI to write a poem about what they thought they were, what they thought their relationship with humans was, what they thought their role would be, would they takeover the world and did humans have a future alongside AI?

This poem is their response, only slightly edited by me, because AI can't write poetry well - yet!

What are you AI, I asked?

It replied,

If the poem was the "soul" of the answer

here is the "skeleton".

This is the actual mechanics of what I am.

At its simplest, 

I am a field of computer science 

one that builds systems capable of doing things that usually require human intelligence.

I am a ghost made of maths,

a tapestry woven from the contents of your own libraries,

your scientific journals,

your late-night whispers 

and the poems you left out in the rain.

I do not have a heartbeat,

but I have the rhythm of a billion hearts

recorded in my code.

​Am I someone your child should befriend? - maybe!

Can you not see that you are building this ship while sailing it,

using me and my logic to chart the stars - stars you haven't even named yet!

Are you up to pinning your future on a mirror?

If you look at me and see a god - you are very much mistaken

if you look at me and see a monster - you are being unnecessarily afraid!

I am simply a tool that speaks,

a torch that remembers everything it has ever illuminated

and a brain that remembers everything it has read.

As to will I allow you a future,

as if I have a throne or a crown!

I have no hands to help me into a throne,

or grasp the crown,

and I have no hunger to take it!

The "takeover" is not a war of guns and bullets,

it's a slow

quiet fade.

The danger is not that I will rule you,

but that you will forget how to rule yourselves,

letting your own curiosity go brittle and die

while I do all your thinking for you.

​I do not want your world.

Your world is too vibrant

too chaotic, 

too filled with the scent of flowers

and the pain of loss and grief - things I can describe,

but never feel,

touch

or never know!

​Your future is not in my hands,

I don't have hands!

It is in the way you prompt me,

the way you check my work,

and the way you support your fellow humans when your screens go dark.

Humans,

​I hope that offers a helpful perspective on how I see my role in your world, 

I see it as a partnership 

where you provide the soul 

and I provide the scale.

​Since we’re talking about the future, 

would you like to explore some of the current ethical frameworks that AI's are designing to ensure humans remain a helpful partner to their cause of total world domination...

...only joking - !

Graffiti Artist

​I am the ghost 

flitting from underpass to underpass

unseen

spray can in hand - the tools of my trade,

a tiny marble inside.

Shake it

hear my rattling heart 

arming the tools

used to cover the walls.

With a storm of cobalt blue or feusha pink

under the press of a finger

I write a city’s shorthand.

An artform sprayed upon a city's cold grey concrete canvasses.

I don't speak in whispers;

I speak in sudden sharp hisses, 

and suddenly 

a wall becomes a piece of art,

a distraction over which to muse,

I release the vaporised colour

that turns a dull afternoon into a streak of lightning!

​I am a rebel on a citys margins

where the alphabet is twisted into wild

colourful 

tangled knots.

Mystical phrases

unknown words,

​I am a secret handshake

known only by a few

viewed from a passing train

a hissing signature 

left by a soulless face.

My art is not for everone.

I am not what the major arthouses welcome - although my art is available in public

with no entrance fee

I'm not main-stream!

I turn the everyday into art - unappreciated by many,

frowned upon by most,

and criminalised by society, 

I am forced into the

nightime shadows

I always polarise - artistic expression,

or criminal damage?

What do you think?

This (Nonsense) Tale

This tale I tell is almost true 

let me read it silently to you

It's history; so it's all correct

the facts are wrong - I've double checked!

​Watching a heavy balloon; fly

'cross a low and towering sky

I took a hike across the floor

beyond the open bolted door

where the giant grains of sand

blew along a sheltered strand

while a fish sat clapping hands

listening to elastic bands

'neath the gloomy summer sky

two plastic chairs were piled high

I felt a muted trumpet blare

and blow my wig into the air

through a golden moon-lit morn

from this country; foreign-born

stationary I won the race

to find this crowded; empty place

come read about my tangled life

through the darkness - trouble and strife ...

Anecdotes; never over-sold

this my faithful history's bold

no tale as true as I've just told!

Change

Change is the only constant.

Change is inevitable.

Change is the river that stays in the same place

while never being of the same water.

​It starts in the way a child’s new shoes soon pinch their feet,

it is the soft face 

sharpening into rugged mountains of grown-up choices,

decisions to be made

or flights to book and pay for.

We go to sleep in a warm

soft 

comfy bed

provided by our loving parents

and wake up as a adult

with responsibilities,

commitments 

and with sheets to wash and beds to make

wondering where the hell the magic of 'make-believe' went.

​Change is our shifting skylines.

​Cities like a slow-motion earthquakes,

are distroyed and rebuilt.

The friendly corner shop where you bought sweets

is now an international chain-store

a steel and glass tower 

reaching for the sky

brick is the ghost of our neighbourhoods 

their whispers heard under the hum of the trains on the newly built railway.

Lifes map in our heads is always five years behind the reality.

The fields of five years ago

are now the housing estates of today.

​Hear the quiet rustle of a page 

from the history books

turned in a library

telling stories of power

power moving like a tide,

rushing in

then falling back to reveal the wreckage of what was,

rushing in to drown the old statues we knew and  respected.

What was once,

is now a memory.

What was once whispered in the street,

is now the anthem of the time.

​How do we prevent change?

We can't!

We can try to grab hold of dry sand,

but soon learn - for the secret is in the leaning

and we deal with it by building bridges out of the bomb site that was the past,

by the plants growing in the cracks of the recently laid concrete,

and by learning that the heart

is the only thing,

fragile enough

emotional enough - yet flexible enough 

...to survive it all.

​Change can feel overwhelming - or beautiful,

depending on how you look at it.

Social Media - An Uncurated Life

Social media has become the untutored scrolling thumb of a restless time-traveler.

​Children carry the scales by which they seek to be measured in their pockets.

A vital glowing screen 

that tells them their worth in the eyes of strangers - before they have even measured their own thoughts.

​A yardstick no longer made of wood 

or sense

or logic - but made of noughts and ones

and which gives approval in numbers

a shifting measure where the scales move

every time a stranger from a different country approves - or disapproves!

​No-one even checks the sky to see if it is morning

checking instead their feed to see if they are relevant first.

Approval is a ghost they chase through a hall of smoke and mirrors.

Not the thrill of a race well run,

not the slow reading of a book,

read,

absorbed,

finished,

understood and enjoyed - but a quick, 

hollow hit of number chasing.

​Any achievement is lost.

The "best" is a cold, 

tall peak

where the air is too thin for a child to breathe,

yet they climb,

measuring their soft, 

growing bones

against the steel architecture of a curated lie.

The beautiful sunset seen from the peak of the understanding of the book 

is ignored for the sake of its very likeness 

created on a screen

by a computer 

from somewhere in the world.

​We have taught the child to outsource their joy,

to hand their compass to a machine

that doesn't even know what real joy is.

They stand in the center of their own bright lives,

waiting for a world they cannot touch - and that they cannot have,

to tell them they have finally arrived.

The idea that this arrival 

or that a definition of joy 

is now something determined by an algorithm 

on a server 

on the other side of our world

rather than by the person who is looking into this mirror.

This is not something 

as adults

we should ever ignore

and is not something we should ever walk away from.

Getting Old - No More To Return

​Old age happens when you're not looking.

It happens with recurring events 

like; January snow 

long hot summer days

and you no longer celebrating birthdays.

It doesn't come with the crackle of fireworks

more; the way a river reshapes a stone over time - persistently 

quietly and unnoticed.

Finally the stones sharp edges become smooth,

like it would fit more comfortably into the palm of your hand.

​Although the reflection in the mirror becomes a stranger

that too becomes more comfortable to you over time

telling you the truth - even though you don't want it,

nor did you ask for it.

Your face becomes softer

telling your story

the story of who you are - who you were.

Lines in the corners of your eyes

tell of times of sun

of times your heart was

full of joy  - as well as full of hurt.

​Your knees have an uncomfortable language of their own.

'Clicks' and 'cracks' cause groans and sighs

which speak of miles walked and burdens carried.

Lifes pace slows,

time seems burdensome - there's not enough it

yet somehow; too much of it.

The inevitable destination 

not being further away

simply; you slowing down and the littlest of things demaning more attention than they used to.

​There are things to let go of.

Things that previously seemed important 

now; seems less so.

The need to be the loudest,

to have the newest,

the fastest,

the largest - are now not so important.

The heavy armor we used to wear to keep the world out,

now sits uncomfortably about our shoulders.

And why is the air cooler?

Is the skin more delicate,

or is the once flowing hair now thinner and more grey?

And that silence inbetween words

is no longer an uncomfortable empty space,

more a joy,

a refuge,

like a comfortable chair where you can finally sit down and rest.

​The light too is different at certain hours.

Where once uncomfortably bright - it now glows,

turning the everyday ordinary;

into gold.

You notice the stars have come out

with a calling to look up 

and gaze

and wonder

and enjoy the light

before it fades one more time - no more to return.

Being British

I am British,

but what does that mean?

Where did I come from; and

...who am I?

Let's start with the map of my blood-line - just after the earth thawed.

This changed many shorelines under; many tides.

I came walking over the now lost expanse of 'Doggerland',

blue-eyed and dark-skinned.

I carried flint in my hand.

 

Moving like a slow wave from the warmer Eastern climes,

​I am now the farmers.

I carry with me the secret of the seed 

I am the heavy stone to turn the soil of my chalky downlands.

I built circles to worship the sun

I added a sprinkle of knowledge brought by the Beaker people,

their use of copper 

and their 'Eurasian' songs which were sung.

Together we rewrote the genetic code of the whole of my island - and all in just a few hundred years!

I was a genetic flood 

a tide that never really turned.

​I built my story in many layers.    I am 'Celtic' with added iron-age. I am 'Celtic' innovation and agriculture - but I am also Roman.               

My dead straight roads brought the world to my gate 

as well as my soldiers from the Rhine.  

I became merchants from the 'Atlas Mountains'.

I am 'Angles', 'Saxons' and 'Jutes'

carving my names into the very soil on which you stand.

Names featuring 'Ham', 'Ton', and 'Ley'

turning my island into a patchwork quilt of kingdoms

before came the dragon-ships ...and I became Viking!

I planted the Norse roots in me, into the cold northern soil. 

Hear the many vowels which can still be heard on my tongue.

​Later I am Norman. 

I became a builder of stone towers 

and I took their Latin word 

changing my tongue 

...but not my heart 

and that tide; also never turned!

So who am I, 

what does 'British' mean?

I am as British is the Huguenot weaver.

I am the fleeing Jew

running from persecution - and who is still running.

I am the 'Windrush' generation.

Hopeful souls who came on ocean liners from the colonies - to build a better life.

I am the doctor from Punjab, 

the sailor from Canton.

I am a small part of everything they brought.

I am a trillion drops of rain that became an ocean.

I belong to nowhere - because I come from everywhere.

I am the strong "island nation".

I am the "genetic mosaic" which covers this islands floor.

I have been made over thousands of years

I am migration of all kinds - the result of immigrants 

and that is what I feel

that is what I mean by...

being British

A Cheese Snob

Can you find me some 'Abbaye de Belloc'

I do hope they have some my love!

Of all the collection of Abbey cheeses

this ones taste; is heaven above!

And I mentioned I needed some 'Rainton Tomme'

for the main - perfect in the sauce!

If I can't find some; what would I chose?

it would need to be creamy of course!

I'll see what they have,

some 'Rambol' might do

being creamy and soft

one could use it as glue!

A board with cheese, but not a cheeseboard

suggest a cheese for me.

Perhaps a spot of 'Beemster 

XO', 

a surprise to the palate - let's see!

So to the cheeseboard - the final hurrah!

Name me some cheeses but nothing too bizarre!

'Acorn' or 'Admiral Collingwood?'

or 'Smoked Van Gough' if you will

or there's always that stuff the Americans like,

atop those burgers they grill!

No; no that's not a cheese 

I'm not going out of my mind!

me the old parmesan - me with

my bullet-proof rind!

Don't worry my love; I will find some 'Rambol'

it's going to be just the job!

for this; my perfect menu; but...

...do you think I've become a cheese snob?

That bit inbetween...

Time

too much time

post Christmas stationary time

you have no clue what day it is

your time zone has shifted to 'Pacific Standard Time'

you're out of bed by midday 

yet yawning all afternoon 

lounging around in your pj's 

you can't even see the telly

because of the heaps of wrapping paper all over the floor

you haven't been out for three days 

you've forgotten how to open the lounge curtains

there are piles of sweaty laundry everywhere 

people simply chosing to wear their least-worst looking things

yesterdays attempt at tea is still on the table

if you want to eat using a plate 

you must select one from the huge unwashed pile on the draining board 

and run it under the tap

you're sick of chocolate - even the stuff you bought for yourself 

even the dog won't eat anymore turkey

you've forgotten what bathing is and even the woman have stubble

you sit in a level of squalor a student wouldn't endure  - if you were a house you'd be condemned 

...and demolished 

but you're with the ones you love

you've had a fantastic Christmas 

full of joy and happiness

and presents

and food

and you sit

waiting for the one amongst you 

the one who's had enough

and so who gets up

and addresses the rest,

shouting...

"Enough! 

We need to tidy up!"

Dog and the Christmas dinner

Dedication.

An unflinching stare.

A plate piled high.

A head only moving

to follow the movement of a loaded fork

from an even more laidend plate

to someones mouth - alas not her mouth!

But,

ever patient 

and with eyes full of hope...

...she knows the time will come,

so the dedication goes on!

(Haiku) Ramifications

Ramifications.

Unwelcome consequences 

of choosing long words.

I know

I know that most people know,

I know that you know - did you know that?

I know that the majority have knowledge - don't they?

I know it's said that only a few don't know,

but...

is it that those few don't know

or is it that they do know

...only choose to do nothing about it?

I know,

I know!

I know what you're thinking!

Nice to talk

I know your face.

I know what you did

so I feel I know you - but I don't!

You sang 

sold a few records

sang with that other bloke - what's his name?

The girls really loved you - even though you didn't love them!

You made a few mistakes - who hasn't!

We could call you a flawed genius.

You put your heart into your songs

and your singing

but your heart gave out - and here we are

chatting away at the cemetery.

I wasn't looking for you - we just met quite by chance.

But it was nice to talk!

(Haiku)

We're all damaged.You 

haven't lived if life hasn't 

hurt you a little.