2
dead write

Dylan Harris

2
dead write

Dylan Harris

Potato Press

by Dylan Harris
4 anticipating the metaverse, 3 nation six dog, 2 dead write

chapbooks
20.0: church is dangerous vital (o),
tin rush (n), the A rush (m), engineering rush again (l),
Miss Demeanour (k), flock state (j), be infinity (i), Namings (h),
nation six dog (g), uncivil law (f), dead write (e), chase chase (d),
an engineering rush (c), a much for we (b), The Joy Of Tax (a)
19.9: Inn (c), Swoop (b), An Ode To The A14 (a)
19.8: Rose (c), Hymnen (b), Darmstadt (a)

Copyright © 1989-2007 Dylan Harris

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Published by Potato Press
Mechelen

(Specify “dead write” in the subject line of any email)
Recitals of some of these poems may be found online

Poems

10	The Joy Of Tax
11	the clarion
19	China Poem
20	poetry
28	Scorpion
29	On Hunting With Hounds
30	gentle
31	New Year’s Eves
32	I Don’t Visit My Mother’s Grave
33	What Do Lemmings Eat?
35	We, The Fell
36	... a much for we ...
37	... And Then I’ll Break The Sea
39	An Eighteenth Century Beam Engine
40	later
41	It’s My Hands
42	Intruder Alert
43	My Difficulty With Melancholy
44	i’d prefer to remember summer
45	A Simple Fantasy
46	Sweet And Stupid
47	Software Engineering
51	bathroom spider
52	Elsewhen
53	Hence The Coldness
54	Fear In Flight, God
56	Thoughts On Odes To Nightingales
57	the three monks
59	Neil Armstrong Is My Explorer Of The Millennium
60	Tobacco’s Such A Treat
62	The Queen Of Santa Fe
63	Sharp
64	old man Keats
66	A Bicycle Criticises Concorde For Not Observing Butterflies
67	chase chase
68	still biting
69	glist
73	discard
81	dead write
82	uncivil law	

Thanks to Jenni Tucker for CB1.

The Joy Of Tax

“Each time you buy your love a gift
they gain some goods they don’t declare.”
said Ima Heirach, quoted for the Revenue. 

“All income should be taxed,
so we intend to introduce
the ‘extra purchase’ rule. 

Say you buy your girlfriend flowers,
one time in three,
you’ll buy an extra bunch
and post it off to us.

And should you buy romantic meals,
one time in three,
you’ll pay for one of us
to join you at the trough. 

And, er, if you and she, um, yes,
well, that’s not our business, yet.
But we’ll tax the consequences,
when they’re fully grown.”

the clarion

lord pisswater’s clarion

the extreme rapist
a Russian madman
killed sixty 

the extreme serial killer
Dr. Harold Shipman
murdered three hundred fifty 

the extreme racist
genocides
five hundred people dead
for each one victim
of Dr. Harold Shipman 

that’s all the souls you love
everyone you’ve ever met 

think their faces now
family
people you chat
every glanced stranger

all of them
dead
skin awful white bloodlessness
life ripped 

that dread vision is where the racist goes
when some big history incites his blind
he dare not civilise his difference terror
allow sane life to those he fears betters 

Serbian Herzegovina
Hutu Burundi
De Montford’s England 

we all have fear of strangers
fear needs courage for control

so how can you not detest
lord pisswater’s clarion
for reciting that howling bigotry
at fallen down outsiders 

and how can you respect a nationalist
who daren’t comprehend his murder of belief
the murder that’s always seen
when his howling fuckalikes
steal the power of state 

we know
lord pisswater’s grandfather
sucked the cock of hitler
but why does this modern fool
suck the cock of hitler’s corpse  

beer and pindar

it’s like believing the gangster lords
and their sister
– female as a volcano –
will break the race
their hounds will win the catford dogs
and i’m there cheering
– the crowd cheers –
and i sing – we sing –
the words of the running dog song
i feel raised like the buddha
to a purity of judgement
i am to decide the race
i naked before a thousand opinions
will pronounce 
i have seen great challenges met
a fox giving up eggs
a farm of trees and engines giving up monotony
a clarion reader giving up racism
so i will make
all those chaotic opinions
all those contradictory bets
all that violent self assertion
wilt 
and there she stands
like a city on fire
promising ecstasy like a fruit promising juice
as naked as a tree in her leaves of spring 
and though england may race like fools for gold
and though lord pisswater may promote his coward gestalt
and though i may burn such a squalid lust
to open her like tower bridge 
i will not pursue
i would be foolish

damn the clarion

let’s get this straight
a rascist cliché states
“us Brits are wondrous at invention
but haven’t got the managers
to transmute ideas to wealth
so all our great creations
enrich non–British companies” 
you’d think the empty peddle heads
would follow through and say
“that since our land needs managers to manage
and foreigners clearly do it well
why let’s invite ten million in” 
yet lord pisswater’s clarion
that peddle rascist daily rank
screech at entrepreneurs
who happen to be foreigners
whom in their rascist hatred–speak
they castigate “economic migrants” 
these foreigners whom in different lands
have the wit of management
the rascists argue ours do not 
so let’s say it straight
the rascists state our managers
are stupid like themselves
“our country’s losing out”
yet screech a parrot hate
at foreign gifted women men
who immigrate and wealth create 
by its own corrupted thoughts
the clarion howls stupidity
is written for idiots

little diddems

aah
poor little diddems
scared of desperate strangers 

there
let little diddems hide
in mother blunket’s black skirts
until those nasty strangers go away 

aah
poor little diddems
little diddems hide 

whilst us grown–ups
negotiate these self–rescuers
enable their ventures
make our worlds rich 

Scared Of Spiders

Some fear spiders
but why extinct them?
What else so controls flies,
the diseases spread?

Some fear immigrants
but why expel them?
what else so generates entrepreneurs,
the wealth spread?

Papers

If a toddler’s scared of beauty,
would a true parent
encourage the baby’s terror?

But then there’s racist logic,
which no doubt is why
Goebbels stood proud
of Pisswater’s mail.

Even the tallest
needs two short planks
to accept the racist
Pisswater mail.  

bigot reinforcement

how to keep your paper bought

incite your customers to hate those only the stupid hate
all the reasonable people tell ’em they’re wankers
since butter is better than fact
you tell ’em they’re intelligent
and all the reasonable people are naïf
for not detesting desperate strangers
and incoming entrepreneurs

keep your customers dim and defensive
too het to hear their many betters
too prickly to break your deception

keep ’em racist
grab their coinage

the only disadvantage
causing the occasional mass–murdering war
but hey
that’s then
this is profit 

China Poem 

China’s history has five thousand years.
I’ve met three poets from two T’ang centuries,
still words transmuted into rushing English. 

All I’ve really found’s my ignorance,
not just of province names and geography,
but of their photo ordinary, to me exotic, moments. 

And if the future foreign people look back to our now,
will they use their times’ conceits
to misunderstand our misconsidered hopes? 

Bollox to living in history, its canine worry.
Listen. Balance. Write, write.
Be.

poetry

push pop

The tradition state:
“let the language move
by charm of physick wit,
chemical syllable glue,
fusions d’etrangers,
and bureaucratic contraptionisations:
poets shall heel.” 

And once the strong words
are meaning squandered,
how shall we poets say? 

The lingo pack is bounding on:
why the fuck aren’t we scouting ahead?

select

when you hear brilliant works
Wordsworth Beethoven
do you recall
their philistines shouted them
avant guarde idiots 

we have those who condemn
who forget their ancient brethren
detested their supposèdly safe heroes 

we thank our past’s enlightened ears
who heard their avant guarde
and selected 

we now
we have the duty
to seek the diamond in the charcoal

but those who don’t try
who stand and piss in
who contribute derision
abuse the taste
their predecessors hated 

we who write
we poets
we must push
must risk 

our glist may die before us
with us
but may survive the hundred years of staid
for some future child
born beyond the death of all the living now
to glint our work alight 

techno

find emotion
can’t see concept
suffocate
or stretch 

lazy leftover fools
attack original
announcing own empty 

i must not let other people’s flaws restrain me
i must grow poetry
i must learn better work 

what

poetry −? words ≡? music
poetry −? music ≡? speech
poetry −? precision ≡? prose 

\(words music precision) ⊂? poetry

poetry ‡ content

Copyleft

Homer, this pub philosopher’s heard,
created to sing The Odyssey,
but ‘only’ edited all The Iliad
combining Helene colleagues’ poetry myth. 

These, the songs that began written epic,
became his world’s Kernighan & Ritchie,
are older than Christianity’s crutch
and every foolish looping nationalist ‘us’. 

Yet we, we only hear the single voice.
Works, once published, are inviolate.
This fat respect prevents relay creation.
We adore The Odyssey. We ignore The Iliad. 

With ‘copyleft’, not for the empty, hated by empire,
programmers reuse and revise others’ recipes
causing original and imitative solidity;
it could prime a time–long poetic chiro–blast. 

Collaboration, writing united, is not the same;
each ego can veto the other’s invention.
A copyleft author can declare and decamp;
others may sooth a clash–cultural chaos. 

This gnu idea, it bypasses the island man’s blindness;
he cannot stop a work deepening through
lives cultures genders generations histories worlds.
Consider the Mahabharata. 

pah!

gotta rag note
“read modern poetry”
oh i do 

it’s old work
obese fill words
lard heavy 

we rush world
yet verbosities still inject
vacant verbal burble 

go get go
push pop the lingo
scout 

early a

find out
i never did
if poetry your mortal moved 

it’s to me as walking
and these I’m written
early a…

Scorpion 

When men are fools, the devil dances sway.
Israeli fools, they swill their neighbours’ land.
The U.S. fools, they paid, they looked away.
Bin Laden dances fey; for this he planned.
Resenting fools, they took his lying school
to learn his angel never fell. He wove
his way. But he’s no devil, just a fool
who starved his human soul, replacing love
with fallen thought, empathy with stone.
His heart is dead, his brain a slave to one
corrupted goal. This man has never blown
a smile to someone new, nor lit a stranger’s fun.
Bin Laden’s men: revive survival checks;
he needs your death for his perverted sex.

On Hunting With Hounds

The anti–hunt majority
for whom the chasing is despicable
but the killing acceptable:
well, that must be so, for otherwise
they would not fill their gravy plates
with pre–masticated carcasses
of what once might have been
conscious animal beings
young and politely murdered. 

gentle 

the rain must have sprinted down 

yet above the consequential rising mist
is an empty open sky moonlight night
and horizon just once cloud mountains
dark and highlit in gentle silver black 

like seeing the stars through fine girl hair
when you’re sitting alone outside night talking
on an unseen bench in the summer dark heat
away from the far heard strong celebration
with a fresh wind carrying her feminine smell
and the gentle hush of her speak

New Year’s Eves

In a pub of pensioned men
and stale décor,
two newly women enter:
one fires her smile. 

She’s young and tough,
and her hair says she’s trying too hard,
and she’s occupying clothes
that leave so much caress undressed:
she’s raw, her own self–portrait. 

But that glance was mercantile:
I was about to buy a drink.
Yet the smile was welcome,
like the scent of shocked basil
on a humid summer day. 

I Don’t Visit My Mother’s Grave

I don’t visit my mother’s grave; 

a stone, a church yard;
these are my sister’s symbols,
not mine. 

I keep my mother in my head,
all the spirit of her,
a mother alone, 

and all the consequences
when she couldn’t really cope
with bringing up a thinking boy
she didn’t understand. 

We needed my father,
whom fate destroyed.

I don’t visit my mother’s grave:
I carry it.

What Do Lemmings Eat? 

What do lemmings eat?
Why, of course, its obvious!
What, you haven’t worked it out?
Well, ask a different question:
what do lemmings do?
Why, of course, they lem;
they lem on yellow Citrus fruit. 

What do pigeons do?
Why, of course, they pidge, and
they’ve pidged all over my car,
the horrible, horrible things. 

And what do katkins eat?
Why, of course, they eat…
Yearch! “How horrible!
Come here, poor puss–cat,
poor tiddle–possum,
we won’t let those nasty plants eat you, will we: No!”
Now, those dead mice you leave in the lounge… 

And what do dolphins do
why, of course, they dolph around,
they chortle in the sea,
wasting time in playful fuss,
not doing any work.
What lazy fun—
we can’t have that—
no dole for them, ha ha. 

And what do muffins do? Well,
it's actually quite disgusting
as disgusting people know.
I, of course, am innocent,
all I’ll say is “mule”. 

We, The Fell 

Oh wow! I haven’t had a decent fight
for years. But let’s not fight with brutal might,
the Net denies the real, and virtual war
is bland. Let’s fight with brutal words, the core
of words, in poetry, with lines of verse
in sonnet form. I challenge you, disperse
the crude, excite your skills, be rude with charm,
not teenage curse nor childish snap, but calm
and contemplative bile. The victor gets
the girl. The loser knows a fight well met
and lost is no disgrace. And if there’s fire,
if what we write has power, we’ll burn the pyre
of formulaic prejudice, the hell
of puritan ideal. We’ll be the fell.

... a much for we ... 

She has no flaw, that her, she put upon
a plinth, be polish once a day. This none
a wishful doze of I, for I concern
to share and hear, a crusty cheer, a yearn
of we’re, the ’uns their gear, I’m slowing dear,
the compromise of kith as someones real.
The daily fem has rough ascribe the heart;
unsanded personality, no dark
of past, comprehending null, a scour.
Since every her is real, the one to flower
is she of fault by skin or eye: such fleck,
like packaging, is simple to respect;
which leave the only damn to bar the see
as mine, a manitude, a much for we. 

... And Then I’ll Break The Sea 

This forest
unlike the myths of concrete times
contains the old,
the dank and breathed–in smell of Earth,
instinctifying air. 

Here,
you have to reach the seas
before you die.
It’s you and no technology
simply walking means
you’ll never smell
the acridity of salt. 

“Run, run”,
the captains cry
from trains of saddled geese above
“find a stream, and catch us fish,
and we will tell you tales of seas—
they’re gold, and green,
and full of cats
and everyone who’s got there now
is fed by ghosts of porpoises
that dream of rocking floweries
and acting in the Scottish play.” 

“Run, run”,
I curse myself,
wanting being first today,
an elephant in trunks. 

Oh dear, I trip,
and lie for life,
and watch the forest melt to love
as I relax for weeks.
I see the sea beside me;
I turn and touch the salt. 

But captains call for me to run;
there’s no–one in the sky. 

And captains plant synthetic wants
relaxing jars and run I should. 

The forest grows,
and run I shall. 

Oh, worshipped work,
my dream’s to break the sea. 

An Eighteenth Century Beam Engine

An Eighteenth century beam engine,
solid,
fixed,
simple, with central power,
a church of steam. 

An engineer approached,
and created
sharp movement of spiking light,
a natural power directed, dangerous,
water torn with untiring ferocity.
Its true purpose, he said, is to
pump the mine dry. 

An artist approaches,
and savours
wild yet predicted movement,
bitter, nasal charcoal,
a noise like Hades imagined,
steam jetting from each and every joint.
Its true purpose, she says, is to
subjegate the senses. 

A shaded man approaches
and ignores,
he counts his beans to three,
thinks of four,
he imagines rows of black and time,
a regiment of flies.
Its true purpose, he says,
is my lust.

later

i’m not exactly brilliant
but you screwed up as much
instead of surfing this wanted insanity
you tried to manage
a so professional voice 

i need a lover
not a mother

It’s My Hands 

It’s my hands
that are addicted. 

When I have a soft–skinned lover,
they’ll caress her,
warming. 

But when she’s elsewhere
they’ll stroke anything
smooth and neutral. 

Railings and banisters,
desktop and mouse,
pint glass and bar. 

Intruder Alert 

A conference theatre, unfilled, the field;
green folding chairs, strewn open, the crop. 

Some poor woman, older, robust, sexless to me,
sits, cross angled. 

Her seat shifts, becomes a vice;
her fingers, trapped, raped, crushed. 

Her shouts scorch, stark pain,
boiling crescendo. People rush. Not me. 

I am shock still,
stunned by lust, by shame. 

I can’t forgive me this.
I can’t.

My Difficulty With Melancholy 

Melancholy fills my eyes like soap,
burning away the glamour of hope;
this drama of darkness is ruined by my cheer:
that rhyme made me :-). I’m off for a beer.

i’d prefer to remember summer 

cold november rain
early dark depressing
i remember sun striking warm 

there’s someone of eye fire and feminine
lithe love ripe
laser of thought 

her man makes her ill with joy
intensity such happiness
how could i ever dare challenge 

yet she in her feminine the feminine way
opportuned me her penchant for complication
i love too much to dare acknowledge
for i am a destroyer 

now cold november’s rain
she’s moved beyond
yet i compare all 

it’s unpleasent
my necessary betrayal
i must ride 

Ovid’s “Remedia Amores”
hard journey
i can’t be november forever

A Simple Fantasy 

I wish you at my fantasy villa
on a fresh sun high–spring day,
where, affront the vineyards and sounded waters,
I’ll carry you to our noon life lore. 

Washed by running children,
their rhythm of pounding
living our bright uneven world,
its afternoon dust
fresh spark light. 

Our sons and daughters,
their selves alone,
will shine in fierce memory. 

And you’ll bury me,
whilst our grandchildren
become emperors of space,
like flowers. 

We’ll love each other dead.

Sweet And Stupid 

Please don’t tickle that,
I’m standing on it. 

There’s more to me
than land between leaps. 

Next time, I’ll dress
before you claw climb my leg. 

I’m sure my best trousers
had fewer holes. 

How can you sleep there,
one roll, two stories from stone? 

Please do not claw me there;
I might want children. 

I got you down from that tree,
why rush back up? 

Dratted kitten
(again)!

Software Engineering 

1.

“Go to The Great Mountain Of The South”,
the boss man pays. 

“Where’s that?”,
the engineer replies. 

“Well, er, to the South! It’s obvious.” 

“I’ve not been there before.” 

“No one’s been there before.
Walk south for a thousand miles
and you’re bound to see a lump on the horizon.
That’ll be The Great Mountain of the South.
They say it smokes; probably cheroots;
that’s the kind of thing a mountain ought to smoke.
Shouldn’t take you an hour.
Here, have a banana.” 

“How do you know?” 

“Hold a ruler up to the horizon
and measured the height of the church roof.
The sun shines on the number one.
It’s obvious.” 

“Pah!” 

“Don’t you Pah! me, little man.
I’ve a degree in art fart sociopath.
I know. 
Now go.” 

“Yes sir, yes sir,
thank you for the pay packet,
kind sir.”

 

2.

walk across the room
no no no
not like that
here’s a diagram
put your feet here here and here
that’s twice on the floor
and once on the wall 

everything’s been thought
by our pet architect
he always says yes
of course it can be done

it’s a pity he’s resigned
his mother died again 

if you find the banana
when you get to the other side
bring it to me

 

3.

It’s not so good
being the failed superhero
‘computer repair man’
when a pretty woman
with excited eyes
finds a true excuse
to bring me to her private rooms. 

“In order to identify the problem,
I need to conduct a system test”.
I turn the computer on,
move the mouse,
click the keys,
and see her pleasure fade
like the last train leaving
as I discover
she needs to find five hundred pound,
her machine’s beyond repair. 

Oh, to be a fertility God,
“in order to identify the problem,
I need to conduct a system test,
please relax, undress;
and enjoy.” 

Some fantasies are so lightweight.

bathroom spider 

there’s no one in the bathroom but you
you’re using the mirror
you can’t turn round
you have to finish 

there’s no one in the mirror but you
the glass fogs
you can’t turn round
you have to finish 

there’s no one’s in the steam but you
you’re nearly …
your uncovered neck
is touched 

it 

is 

terrified 

Elsewhen 

It’s wrong, right,
what youngers do,
daynight. 

But,
when I was then,
I did so
too. 

Right it was,
then,
that when. 

Stupid,
now,
I was. 

Elastic stretches less
the more it’s overused.

Hence The Coldness 

It’s nice to know
you don’t consider me
as worth the grief
of clicking on ‘reply’
and typing
N 
then O.

Fear In Flight, God 
a poem in two forms 

1.

While driving home, this winter night,
I saw the orange greenhouse light
illuminate the sky. 

The telly says, in Pakistan,
a hijacked plane, the bastards gone,
they killed a two–day groom. 

An airport near, another crash,
a cargo plane, the pilot’s dash–
ing self–belief, now dead. 

A glass of wine, the need for sleep,
this cyclic time, disturbed relief,
so naturally I dream... 

2.

I’m drinking Rosé,
the colour of inhuman blood,
watching. 

From night–time winter nurseries
cylinders of bright orange light
rise to the lowering cloud,
and spread like petals,
dying. 

Hijackers
murder a bridegroom
for sight. 

Elsewhere,
the heat is so extreme
that shocked birds
flying far above flames
ignite,
falling as shells,
incrementing death. 

They think
to reduce their nation’s pain
by adding to it. 

This is a time of cyclic myth
of winter solstice,
of Y2K,
of Christian birth. 

Today’s God consumes.

Thoughts On Odes To Nightingales

So what is this nightingale
    of which the old poets sing? 

I drive to country dykes, to dust,
    and hear a throat of motorway. 

I climb a Munro hill, by rail,
    and hear the tourist café chat. 

I dive the barrier reef’s remains
    and hear an abstract diesel chant. 

Those poets,
they blaze their praise
of this bird I’ve not heard. 

I think, you know, the nightingale’s an allergy
to dance, or punk, or what the poet hates,
the one that he or she desires,
appreciates. 

So next you find an ode
to a nightingale’s airy delight,
make your thoughts Sir Oswald Osbourne
biting the head off a chicken that night. 

the three monks 

the only mountains in England
apart from those hills in the north
called mountains by fixing the rules 

are the three monks
tall the way children see gods
shadow on all the flat Cambridgeshire 

the remains of some prehistoric volcano
tan brown rock absorbing sun shining on vertical
up and fractal bare to the very top 

where each peak rounds inward
a colony of hard green pine
the fringe on the heads of the pious 

these three stalwarts surround
the fussy little town of Tull
on the March to Sleaford road 

flat and straight across the fens
up and down and winding round
flat and fenland straight again 

and why do you not know these monks
natural cathedrals of geology
dominating the tower of God–love Ely 

military deceit maps the monks as meres
see the mars of shocked German bombers
and that pair of nuclear B–52s 

there’s talk of some visual disguise
you’ll glance to see unfocused air
only wise eyes will comprehend

Neil Armstrong Is My Explorer Of The Millennium 

He did much more
than simply explore
someone else’s home.

His shoulders stand
so we might land
on some dusty lunar shore.

Tobacco’s Such A Treat

If barons never bribe,
authorities are pure,
then why deny research,
why ban the brightest cure? 

Chorus:
Tobacco’s such a treat
and dope is danger grass,
so says the law’s conceit:
for parliament’s an arse! 

Some victims die of drugs
too strong, or full of crap;
when licensing applies
inspectors slap that rap.  

Chorus:
Tobacco’s such a treat
and dope is danger grass,
so says the law’s conceit.
The government’s an arse! 

Addictive drugs are banned,
which makes the barons rich.
The baccy tax is high,
the government is rich. 

Chorus:
Tobacco’s such a treat
and dope is danger grass,
so says the law’s conceit:
the minister’s an arse! 

A uniform is forced
so kids hate that, not school;
as prohibition laws
conceal the true misrule. 

Chorus:
Tobacco’s such a treat
and dope is danger grass,
so says the law. Repeat:
yes, parliament’s an arse!
The government’s an arse!
The minister’s an arse!

The Queen Of Santa Fe 

My memories are slippery and sharp,
and coloured by the heat of her,
adventurous and sweet. 

Three months ago, I met the Queen of Santa Fe,
her hair as red and long as twenty seven years. 

She caught my English words, 

her throne and duty may have been this city in the dust,
but she’d never left her Isis home,
a council youth, a river bank, 

a teacher with the petulance to force a lifetime long–haired girl
to cut her pride, to mark the drought of ’76. 

She heard my English words 

and spoke, exuberant,
compleat of drink and desert glow,
she spread her history. 

She kept my English words, 

and dreamt her night in Oxfordshire,
as snow caressed the foreign lands
where she will ride forever.

Sharp

I saw disease kill my mother slowly,
eating her movement. 

No matter how much the death expected,
shock stains the grief. 

It made me silly stupid:
I brewed a cup of coffee
and put it in the fridge. 

Those around can care resolve.
Even my high tail cat observed
and fussed me her affection. 

Here.
I know your pain.
Let me care. 

old man Keats

i’m walking these empty lands
i’m old slow and graceless
the air’s bracing a lonely cold 

i’m enthralled by recollection
we here such love
so young 

i lost limp onto war
black red military battle
the stench of dogma 

i’m too slow
they execute could–be spies
dying surely waits for me 

if i’m to die violent
i’ll sneer the killers
i’ll be all they can’t 

i shelter ruins
i lay my pack unpacked
groundsheet peasent food water
‘hours of idleness’

the battle flows turbulent
unpredictable waves conflict
the blood wash nears ebbs nears 

those trained to die do quickly
survivors dance the killing ballet
turning luck burns their victory 

a squad and sergeant tumble me accidental
glance aghast at my civil taunt
one lad speaks a runner runs

and returns a captain rides up
like the emperor he used to be
sad laughter the squad is guard 

the battle sprints
the others swarm
confrontation 

but a man shouts ‘old man Keats’
shock stop and hardly believe
both swarms curse and tension guard 

sod the lot of them
when we were here
wilderness lovers
we were a better bang 

even though i’m dead
i’m not allowed to die
but soon i will run the dark road
return to you

A Bicycle Criticises Concorde For Not Observing Butterflies 

Within a fiction,
set in Samurai Japan,
there are a hundred men,
on a beach, rows, dead. 

They were betrayed, not by their leader,
who let an enemy ooze behind lines,
not by their pointless simple honour;
no, they were betrayed by their author. 

“So what?”, you might say,
“they’re only characters in a cheap novel”,
“if that”, you might add,
“hardly worth their sentence.” 

But had any one of them,
dead to sharp that moment’s plot,
lived beyond their author’s laziness;
they could be: what? 

Perhaps these non–born,
having snatched creation
for such a callous blink,
deserved their self–assassination;
they could have chosen a better book. 

The film was, of course, successful. 

chase chase

a real smile presented me
a gleaming dish of crumble 

speckled with berry–red and moist
something to very much like 

i take the first mouthful
a rush of flavour fruit 

then a tooth is broke on stone
emotion like fingers in boiling 

many men relish
chase chase 

but i detes 

still biting 
in memory of Dave Wise

“i’ve got death” he’d said
staring me 

he knew
i know
some journeys
you just ride 

his funeral… 

no mine
i’ll have the Ahknaten’s wake
sweat the mourning out

he’d enjoy it
laugh
called me a prat… 

i should have held courage
worn my black bow tie 

glist

1

the packets arrive marketing–liar glint
bright inside–see glisted envelopes
creating excited saliva undercurrent
promising just–once–more consumption desire
this–time the–last–time sate–now never–more lies 

i’m immune junky crash–sale head–warp madness pharm–glit
less so drink–drunk like–now hurt–soon make–shout
my weakness they know my weakness these glisted promises
exotic–freedom strange–use want–buy must–buy rush
lucky dark–dread consequence only bailiff–court–sneer

2

absorb descriptor
adore review
runrun purchase 

unreleased 

bollocks to the bastards
using my enthuse
to seek orders 

discard their abuse
the press 

them 0

3

all the glisted conmen 

ad they’re the lady
smooth skin and glisten lust
a this is yours this now 

ad they’re the guy
water–skipping every else to only you
they can’t stop
you can’t move 

but where’s the glisted guarentee
where’s the promised consequentials

all the glisted conmen
they’ll never deliver 

4

seek research build fulfil report
if you must 

seek reuse brag
if you can 

obey the law
minimal cost

remember
adverts boasting quality
its cheaper to law and lie 

discard

1 

possession’s ownership discarded 

no longer mild nostalgia replayed at bored will
the listening must wait for random radio schedule
or rare shared taste in complexity
an intellectual heat best held back unfed
to audience 

no more only opened by my hand
pausing shallow tales retold
nor exploration of non–sequential centuries
libraries will help me roll speculation
the texture of someone else’s careful dream
ingested rewritten thrown 

no rectangle again captured vision
no wild land linear geometry
no raw cultivation
no mechanical ecology
these i will revisit
creating sarcastic dimensional click shots
sneering this plodding nation’s dalek bigotry

2 

absence won’t bloat must keep space
non–existence can’t yet be rip violate stolen 

only never belonged
cause no duty

3 

i would lie if i tried to deny
that releasing my collected objects of youth
does not edge doubt’s adrenalin
does not discomfort otherwise unminded moments 

but i commit
i sacrifice property’s toil
to make 

4 

i didn’t expect a sign 

after unclasping the first grasp
a stranger a strange bar a strange city
he spoke to me

i rarely chat but this time i did
and found an ordinary old man rhymer
proud of his ordinary lines
clasping his love for a heroin fuckwit
she’s his siren
she’s spending his blood 

perhaps he spoke a novel’s plot
to impress
for he was no anger 

but he has gifted me 

5

i’m tense discorded
on abandon past 

i cannot fund these claspings
i cannot hold the stressing 

favoured farmyard animals
corralled to the slaughterhouse 

6

i am this week’s
blame–worm 

dare i discard work
when more is risk 

but i am discarding
all my its are burning 

i dare discard work
when more is risk 

all the glisted conmen
can drink the piss they proud

7

smash the door glass
watch the shatter
thread the hooligan chain
lift

the old steel wistful
flies young again
to corrupted heaps
piled long away 

a callous day

8

relocate by rip and fall
absolute assurance reliable as luck 

destination a plain town
parochial

where common are the happy clappy
reciters of hand–me–down hate

dead write 

mate dies
rush write 

my head’s a bath
mourning rimfilled 

sloughing the overflow
down this 

uncivil law

“… Over 1.6 million claims were made in 2000 for money owed by one person to another … only 36,000 debt cases went to trial …” 
DTi Press Release 7th February 2002

“… 1912 … The National Telephone Company provided for 561,738 subscribers altogether …” 
UK TELEPHONE HISTORY, R Fishwater.

“… [William] Gladstone had one of the earliest telephones installed at Hawarden. It was there from 1880.”
p391 of Gladstone, Roy Jenkins, Macmillan ISBN 0-333-60216-1 (1995)

centuries

the nineteenth century
schools for the rich doctors for money properteers vote
justice is bought 

the twenty–first century
schools by right doctors by right votes by right
justice is bought 

unjustice

1.
right justice
requires good law
and balanced judgement 

2.
all those principles you should be thinking of
listening all sides not taking bribes
consistency consequences completeness
retribution mercy 
how can balance be
without every one 

3.
good law’s for parliament
that’s another row 

4.
too many courts
don’t bother announce a case
don’t effort to hear defence
don’t report pronouncing
don’t treat balance
as worth the cost of phoning up
and hearing each opinion 
that’s two pence
of their billionaire flow 

5.
without water there is no ocean
without balance there is no justice 

6.
no phone
no email
no fax
no messaging 
just write to be ignored
as though the fifteenth century
had a stretch of sanity
and forced their judges to accept
king henry’s mail
but the courts reneged
by castrating written pleas
as dementia 

7.
and when answering an accusation
how does where you are now
affect the facts then 
yes
if you’re there
the prostitutes of barristing can interrogate
can leer at body language
can opine honesty 
but why prevent all the distance interaction
why prevent so much expression of defence 

8.
authorities proudly claim
in almost every money case
there is no defence
“so make your rampant accusations
on our network site” 
they’d sell titanic tickets
“sail the ship see the ocean floor” 

9.
walking sticks and hobbled men
balance and justice
kick a stick a helpless man falls
kick defence justice fell 

10.
a simple means to say
could simply be accepted
it’s quick to make the phone secure
as do the banks

11.
or is technology monster
frightening decrepit law
declining childhood

12.
english civil law broke
when phones became so popular
ninety years ago 

english civil law was corrupted
when phones became ubiquitous
fifty years ago 

13.
and for those who don’t understand
than an alternative is not an obligation
yes i know not everyone has a phone
a mobile email the web fax
and whatever geek creations
make tomorrow strange
nor does everyone have a home
a postal address
yet the law presumes 
and insists we all pretend
the snail
that inefficient polluting collapsing archaic
postal service
is perfection 

14.
email uses seconds and costs as zero
to translate the world
the post uses days
and costs infinitely more
to cross the road 

15.
if civil law had justice
all defenders would be heard

16.
generations have been prevented
law can’t be arsed to fetch defence
nor permit its presentation in the manner of the time 

17.
this is more than mere rot
this is more than britain’s culture of incompetence
english civil law’s corrupt

18.
boil the gargoyle

complexity

i recall the proud pronouncement
in nineteen eighty ish
that computers have become
the most complex of systems
created by mankind 

now this complexity has grown
ten thousand times
like embryo to adult 

english law has not 

yet computers do not need a ring of nerds
advising any mundane man on how to what
telling them which click to where or when to mouse 

complexity is simply used
no expert stammers round 

law
that such a simple system
needs heards of clever beagles
merely to operate
condemns itself 

money

those system shapers that legal club
if choiced by some mechanical decision
with balanced either or
one excites the wallet
the other does not
they’ll drink the golden shower 

for neither cause fair thinker fuss
yet else the greedy will irate 

such choice may flare
just once an equinox
but sum across the centuries
from socrates to now
to find our folding note bordello 

this is where cold thatcher air needs to hail
a “Legal Relations Act” perhaps 

competition investigation
cartel disintegration
hard regulation 

smirk

i have confirmed
by “watch the system do”
not “hello really nice people
tell me all the faults you’ve got” 

they won’t commit
a simple coin
to lift a speaking handset
to help a hearing fair 

but they’ll commit
the cost of brothel nights
driving petrol and pollution
bullying enforcement 

to be right that great principle
isn’t worth a penny
for power that great corrupter
they’ll spend a hundred pound

flame

anecdotally on the net in mailing list or usenet news
it’s quick to rant a hate or fire a sniper shout
insulting people somewhere else
discarded phrases causing rile 

but on the net in chatting space
it’s hard to turn away apologising balm
the cleaning up of conversation mess
natter mutter data
unworded taken back 

in conversation your draft asserts are chopped
before they set entrenched 

when you set a written down
there is no sneering chuckle
to put you back to right
you guard your silly place

more retreats and more defend and more assault
it’s all more hate and time 

if a problem’s for resolve use a conversation
if a problem’s for exacerbate use a written down 

who likes to writ and word
who charges by the hour 

when accused in ranting print
when clever nicely lines attack 

moon

magistrates

a genuine summons grudges defence 
admitting attackers may only be imperfect gods 

but i have one telling me
i shall plead guilty and how to pay 
it does not accept the assaulters might be human
it chants con 

the summons states no phone
none on the paperworks none on the 192
how can i ring check confirm 

the aggressor the self belief perfection the local council
haven’t done the work 

age

if i doze in stained underwear
so be it
if the telly mumbles so i turn it loud
so be it
if you cook lunch so late i shout
so be it

food has no flavour
arthritis burns my temper
i sneer your silent fear 

wrong

saying you'll kill
or killing
which is worse 

ignore the polished junk asserts
binocular to english civil law
see the done 

now dream a balance scale
dump a barn of glisted tricks on a single plate
that’s it—that’s their balance act 

with no civil court
no crass imbalance in almost every case
there’d be no judicial wrongs enforced 

having no system’s better
than english civil law 

fixing the leather’s not enough
shoot the horses
slide the entangled net 

invention

on the intellectual radio
a british inventors’ society man
strongly chunks support for patent laws
but admits to one disadvantage 

if your patent idea is stolen
by some glass–glare water–floss corporation
whom in defence of livelihood
you take to court 

you’ll make each lawyer more in months
than every penny ever to be earned
by any man who spends his life
pulling lives from burning fire 

no matter it’s your invention stolen
the men of theft will reboot court
until they victory
pissing cash to drown

so if you and your back garden inventor’s shed
have no rapacious millions
financial psychopaths
rape the construction of your life 

how things would change
if justice had import
to english civil law

scotland

i’ve received a citation
i think that means a summons
from a scottish court
post case 

no preceding note remarking its existence 
no call acquiring my defence 
no court report 
no number for me to seek what’s happened 
no email 
no fax 
no web 
no courtesy 

i fear the scottish system’s as rotten as the english 

criminal

a mother’s convicted for killing her child
the barristers hid the medical fact
the child was dead by meningitis
innocent grieving convicted 

the husband informed the system it lies
the anglo–legals belted him bankrupt
justice to them’s a charge not a right
innocent grieving convicted 

a decade or so the destructor’s exposed
the corrupted asleep by clarion woke
the criminal system its title fulfilled
innocent grieving convicted 

democracy

democracy at least
enables change of government
without an insurrection
or civil war destroy 

we who vote
we own the result
we choice the politicians
we choice the consequences 

if a cornered state
has some nasty act to make
which angers many citizens
if the tumult people do not own 
if their politicians fail to salve the anger 

opinion may coagulate about some other means
to reparate the state 
revolt insurrection civil war 

this is risk destruction
like when a rag hysteria
incites a pride of fools
to lynch a children’s doctor 

so politicians flurried
when half the voters slept the last election 
politicians flurried
to pre-empt denial
of no easy choice

consent

the courts are unelected
but we can meter consent
by black box counting
voluntary attendance 
we can mark their foul pride
of only one percent defend 

this unconsent to judgement 
it risks an unpredicted
coagulating anger to collapse
judiciary democracy stability

piano

this piano is always played
but slowly slowly loosens pitch
drifting keys flex a growing dissonance 

the pianists do not hear
they are exercising ever exercising
as the tone declines across the octades 

we
we summonsed
we hear their scratching clash 
we see their schadenfreuderern
pillocks in the audience
mirthed 

enough 
i have hired the sphinx’s amplifier
speakers the size of pyramids
the rasta dj 

they’re on the way

parliament

the courts for sure maintain their free to act 
but i’m concerned by parliament
independent supposèdly of courtly ways 
it needs it must be able
to cure a justice mess 

the plebiscite can like to vote opponents in 
legals the largest brat amongst MPs 
can like to keep their outside skills alive 
but don’t have time to educate for change
so lawyers still have strong appeal
to tinker with the courtly flies
and let a justice failure be 

like drivers in always shunting goods yards
who only see the slowly moving wagons
not the stretching railway
not the can’t–stop–in–time ramping express

they’ll not decide to fix a mess
they haven’t noticed happen yet 

the executive part–neutered parliament by whips enticing power 
justice part–neutered parliament by colonisation 

we need a rule that legal lads both girls and boys
are barred to candidate for parliament
unless their justice membership be eternally revoked

citizen

so what to do when faced with courts believed corrupt 
the arguments of lawyers are reputèdly superb
their clever pose can talk a jury into saying
“the birmingham six they did that bomb”
when all they did was cards 
it helps was fixed the evidence
of course no advocate would aid in that 

corruption burns the soul
once you’ve broken conscience it doesn’t die 
even strangers note a smile and reflex tick

you’ll have no repair
you can't depend on history to lie
you’ll never able calm 

soul demands you avoid corrupt 
but if you stay away the court aggressing credit pushers
or local clockwork men or chancers on a vampire trip
will legal blag your property 

golden showers or freedom
mister jones next door or ghandi christ the buddha
property or soul 

which would you prefer

bailiff

predated by a seizing bailiff
as predicted
the cost for keeping conscience sweet
my caressing photo kit
long silent for poetry
now silent for eternity
a consequence of metering
the corruption of uncivil law 

she wore disdain the bailiff
a funeral prinz–net
closed across her face
arrogant as conviction
an archaic heirach
eyes closed to the active world
judging not by cultural contribution
just tit dropping and easy marionette 

perhaps if i were given proof
that all we’d ever done
us colleagues in the corral
destroyed its own intent
could i state my doubt aloud
or suppress the subtle evidence
burk the person proving 

yes
i should have paid the revenue
but they assured they’d free and never did
the cash of mine they’d stolen “accidentally”
redundancy had paid to me
all those years ago 

and they may have done
if english civil law
had thought balance
worth the pence of phoning up
and hearing each opinion

bones

my bones
my worthless political bones
imagine a year or few
and civil law corrupt will media aware 
five more and “something must be done”
ten to “burn it out start again” 
twenty to incinerate the bureaucratic clutter
introduce a fairness bright and whistle calling
a shrine to light a balanced court 

too long
plans must be right now
for a system new to activate
should democracy be startled 

right justice requires good law and balanced judgement 
go beagles go
break create ready make 

health

the american medical system
is like the himalayas
so many peaks of excellence
it’s quick to blind to valleys in between
where more children drown in childbirth
than is honourable to a pirate 

our nhs
has no peaks of bright
nor that sinful count of infant death
it bureaucrats on greatest good
not on greatest wallet 

maid

see you affront your eyes the balance scale
the civil legals dropped accruing foul
and flaw the high court statue holds the fail
unbroken in distruth so falsely proud
of rules to gloss defence unsaid one side
ignored is not a neutral test except
it’s just to parasitic eyes the bride
of parliament has kept her scales unswept
to concentrate on cleaning rules as life
is run as cause rotates to nought as crime
gives history to gentlemen of strife
and rape the maid of law is shining grime
look burn the rot make clean the darwin glass
the nation’s moved catch up with us run fast

blackbox

black box analysis
investigates complexity 
should you cannot look internal
or too much there is to see

you won’t understand a crab’s desire
by breaking it’s life 
chasing tracing counting
neurons veins cells 
no leave it be
let it sense let it do
watch 

compare results ideal 

if crabs contradict ideal
ideal is wrong 

if justice contradicts ideal
justice is wrong

53

53 women physically raped
suicide tried and lives distraught
the criminal doctor's imprisoned 

53 victims financially raped
suicide tried and lives distraught
the criminal lawyer's embarrassed

fear

i see so simple
so obvious so wrong 

what else corrupted
lies beyond eye see 

	

					

			

							6.6.6