And this is not poetry

Hello. And so:

180k dead

Tories +2%

Getting pissed up whilst the rest of us can’t mourn

Tories +4%

Awash with Russian money and compromised to shit

Tories +6%

Foodbank use up 170%

Tories +8%

Fuel and food prices soaring. Heat or eat. Kids going hungry.

Tories +10%

Right to protest curtailed. Illegal to gather and show solidarity.

Tories +12%

Billions written off for the fucking big companies. Mates given huge contracts.

Tories +14%

Are we getting this yet? Does it make sense? Clearly not.

Tories +16%

There’s nothing poetic as far as I can see

when these corrupt charlatans keep getting voted in.

What the fuck is wrong with the UK?

I'm tempted to say: Everyfuckingthing. 

Fuck this place, and fuck you if you voted for these cunts. 

You have blood on your hands. You are complicit.

Makes me want to believe in a God so you get judged 

for your fucking collaboration in this self-immolating shit. 

Imagine a government at war with its own people.

No need to imagine it.

Just open your fucking eyes. Jesus. They're evil.

Tories + 2000000%

Fuck me too for not doing more about this. 

Fuck me for feeling hopeless.

Shoo -20%.

But I’m not done yet. Far from it:

I'm cursed with belief in the human spirit.

(Performance online - click here)

A Thousand Days of Sun - full novel

 If anyone's bothered, here's a link to my 80k word novel, which formed part of my PhD. The analysis is also included so fill yer boots. 

No refunds.

This is not a list

I don’t cook

like I used to

I have no urge

I just don’t want to

I had two books

to write

for myself, or maybe

one might

have gotten a deal

or both

or neither, but now

fuck knows

if I’ll ever go back

and carry on

I think perhaps

those days’ve gone.

I don’t smile

like I used to

I’m finding ways

to want to.

I can’t be arsed

setting up mics

I can’t be arsed

getting sound right

It does my head

right in

That the fucking songs

keep coming

one take is all

they’re gonna get

Instant upload

done. Dusted. Next.

I keep waking up,

no matter what.

Mornings are bright

tho I’m not.

I’m stuck here now

Until I’m not.

I’m stuck here now

no matter what.

I wasn’t gonna

make a list.

I tried not to.

I aimed.

I missed.

The Boy Who Got On The Bus

A while back, a kid got on a bus and didn’t sit next to a girl with a beautiful neck, deciding to sit next to me instead.

Yesterday, a different young woman got on the bus at a different stop, and sat on her own.

A few stops later, a young lad got on, and they knew each other a bit clearly cause he sort of did a little shy wave to her and she did the same back.

Now, there were plenty of free seats and he could have taken any single one, or a double to himself, or – and this would have broken me – sat next to me.

He could have left it at that. A wave, a little acknowledgement of each other, and then sit somewhere, headphones on, looking out the window and sometimes glancing at her reflection in the glass.

But he sat next to her, and it was lovely, because he was a sort of little hamster-faced bloke but he was smiling and not talking to her but listening and she was smiling and chatting with him. And, yes, she twirled her fingers in her hair sometimes, and, yes, he was on his best, nicest behaviour, but it was clearly honest.

I don’t know what happened when they left the bus to go to their college or whatever, or whether they would go out or get on with each other outside of the confines of Arriva’s grimy-windowed chuggers.

But for that ten minutes, they were both in the moment, and in the moment together.

It was lovely, and it was enough.

Untwinings

Quite some time ago

a lifetime or two past,

not decades but years,

the bustrip screenshot

the trees who reached

for each other,

intertwining,

catching each other’s leaves

dropped with care;

love-gifts

promise new flowers.

Let the record show

that nothing can last:

no embraces, nor tears,

an ignoble rot

makes mulch of our dreams.

Soil smothers

and unbreathing

rootstock dies too; trees

no longer there,

only missed

by bus travellers.

And the seasons flow

in both directions:

a locus-point here

for the fallen forgotten.

But listen – the eons

can uncover

the flap of a wing

and the miniscule breathing

of the hare,

which rake rifts

in the forever.

AMWAT: The End Game (again)

 Unsurprisingly, the zombie club has been suspended from all football for non-payment of wages, and continues to attract fines every time they miss a game because of the same.

Now, this doesn't necessarily mean the end of the story. And neither does the fact that they haven't applied for a licence for tiers 2 or 3.

But it does mean that - in the unlikely event that the administration does not simply go bust completely - any regime would have to start at the bottom again, quite possibly Tier 4 (where 1876 are currently) or even Tier 5 (where 1876 had to start).

There are still some whoppers on one of the old message boards trying to puke out the same old idiocy about 'collaborators, traitors, twixers' and the rest of it. What a ridiculous thing to nail your colours to. And what a moron you must be to cling to the long-disgraced rags masquerading as a Bangor club.

Ymlaen, forward, and fan-owned: if 1876 get promoted to Tier 3 next season the adventure hots up. If we don't, it'll be on footballing terms and never anything off the pitch, which is how it should be.

And we'll stay at Treborth, I hope. Nantporth is cursed, and falling down through a mix of neglect and shoddy building standards in the first place. Long-gone is that manicured pitch, lovingly curated by a groundsman treated like shit in the first throes of this drawn-out death rattle.

twenty twenty two

this year there will be

0 (zero)

new years resolutions

∞

because there is

0 (no)

future in dreaming

be that england or wherever else

∞

and the pressure

has to drop

has to drop

∞

give me peace and

0 (zero)

kicks in the life please

∞

that's all i ask

but i do not expect much

to be honest

∞

0 (zero)

would be a start

and an end

and maybe i could cope

with it that way

∞

be safe please and

maybe happy can come

i think it will

there is lots of love you know

∞

there is lots of it

an unlimited amount

so many outlets

in or out

∞

day by day anyway

the only way

peace