the setllers and a lion

The Settlers and a Lion

Ceci,l the lion was shot by a dentist and the twitter world

is in an uproar find him, pull out his teeth and kill him,

the dentist will go down in as a

 historic footnote of

ignominy and his many children have to change names.

A Palestinian child was killed by Israeli settlers and for

a brief moment the people of Israel woke from their stupor

 their leaders were aghast like it has not happened before.

so many houses bulldozed so many olive trees chopped down

yet the Palestinians stay despite being killed slowly.

And in a few days this atrocity will be forgotten and there

will a shift the victims get the blame by a press who tries to

be even-handed but know who foots the bill.

love is odd

love is odd

Love is Odd.

She is in the kitchen cooking something for tomorrow

I do not criticise what she is doing

when I did she shouted like a tempest and silenced me.

we spoke and I promised not to make comment on

her frequent use of the washing machine and I promised

when peeing in the night to keep the stream in the pot

which is not easy three in the morning?

My wife went to see a doctor today, and she has seen

many but I made no sarcastic remarks, she has exhausted

all the doctors in our town and the net widens.

Love you see it tolerate your partner`s obsession and

dutifully listen to her symptoms. I do this without shouting

although a valium helps

As the days cool

As the day cools

It is getting a bit lonely here

as I`m  not a member of the expat set

and my Portuguese friends have died

or moved into town, living in a village that

lack what elderly people need

and has made into town`s to be near

the family.

The local English newspaper here that

used to take in my poems and opinions has

got a new editor and strictly commercial

I tried years ago to play golf, but I found the clubs

pretentious and also expensive

and my comments about this vast waste of time

was not welcome.

It is difficult to be a socialist around here, for

my wife, it is as bad as having a dog in the house.

I have been thinking of getting an elderly dog

as a companion, one that has suffered loss

to give it a few years of happiness doesn’t sound

like socialism to me. 

over fifty

Over fifty

When you are over fifty divorced and want to meet a woman

– there may of them about- they all have a daughter who will

not let your late romance in peace and you will always play

the second fiddle the phone will ring late at night some trivial

drama you have to take an interest the daughter who doesn`t

 care about your feeling it is her mother`s love she have to make

sure she is not forgotten by the beast of a man she has met,

and demand unspeakable sex acts my mother has to perform.

Yet they need your money for education and often for doing

nothing and sleeping to twelve and expecting to be fed.

Middle aged man all women of over fifty have a daughter who

who will never accept you as a dad, but only as a provider.

the gay agenda

The Gay Agenda

The green bushes of the vine those that were

avoided by bees are fluffing about in the summer

breeze wanting to be recognized for their charm

even thought they were not fertile they kept

nature amused on sunny days, but they can

be no more than fluff, nature`s clowns which we

need in times of hardship and as for their banner

they will never find the rainbow and how much

they try will always be the joker in the deck of cards.

sparrows just like us

The sparrows just like us

He fell from the dry, hot sky first the male

sparrows, it could be because he was older than here

and had developed a habit of hunting near

the large chimneys at the chemical factory and it was

up to the young widow, she had been a fledgling

the year before to feed and bring up five hungry chicks

and if the weather was not cooling she to would

folds her wings and fall on the bonnet of a passing car

and snakes and crows would be moving in.

The famous actor Omar Sharif has passed away, he will

 be remembered but as the demise of a family

of sparrows will like us be forgotten not be missed in

the lottery of life 

Angela Merkel

Angela Merkel

Angela  Merkel

I have seen Angela Merkel naked
it was on a nude beach

in East Germany and she was a
young  communist

member of the party, the only
way one had to go if not

being stuck in a factory job.
Angela back then had

a rounded body not quite Ruben
but a body that had in

had the frame of a
middle-class Germanic sexuality.

She had by then staked her
political future and she had

no time for suitors which
belonged to no party?

And she did right when East
Germany went into freefall

she was there taking note and
agreeing with the west.

But Merkel is history less, she
has disregarded her past

yet  her socialism
instinct must give her sleepless nights

Greece cannot be bought by
German Marks and they are

not disciplinarian by nature
that can be cured by

a bracing North Sea
beach. 

words in my mouth

words

Democracy

is like poetry

only nice

when it flatters us 

French culture

is about the female believing

she is beautiful

Perfume

even the expensive one

is not about cleanliness

the Louvre

had everything

except a proper loo

Small hotel in Paris

hot water for shower

on  Saturdays 

Planets

Planets

Planets

Pluto the charming little planet has got snow

not that anyone is going there soon it is good

to know how useless information pleases us.

a cat is not wise it only makes us feel good

to think Pluto is a cartoon dog and not a cat.

The grapes on the vines still need another month

before they can be harvested and that is ok by me

it is a beautiful day and far away from war,

treachery and the vanity of man.

Cold and alone Pluto can hang there as a faded

lampshade while we should try to discover more about

ourselves and the world we live in. 

a summer remembered | Write Out Loud

a summer remembered | Write Out Loud

Summer Remembered.

It is odd in a country where winter last 8 months is it
spring and summer

we remember and there were not too many of the good days
either.

We took a ferry boat to a small Island for bathing now it is
connected to

a bridge and parking spots take up the most land. Mother
liked to go

there on Sundays she enjoyed the water, she swam like a seal
and floated

like a wine cork thrown from a yacht, I was waddling in
shallow water

collecting shiny objects that had the ability to lose its
gloss when we came

home. My mother divorced at the time her lover was the ferryboat
skipper

I think he wore uniform, it is jeans now for everyone and
anyway with

a bridge who needs a boat, but they did go on camping
holiday together and

I looked after myself. Mother loved him and he wanted to
marry her but didn’t

want me it was silly of him to ask a mother will always
choose her children.

Anyway it was winter approaching and Norway sleeps like the
brown bear for

eight months if not going to boring places like Ibiza back
then.

the watershed

The Watershed

There was a time when 45, I thought life had passed me by

I had spent too much time seeing the night train leave.

Through the rain, soaked train windows saw people reading

some looked into space and there were those who tried

not to cry. My friends had drifted away and my old mate

Trond had found God and to think we sat all night long

talking about books and in the morning we went out in his

boat fishing drinking cold beer and falling asleep as spring

the sun danced on the blue water in the fjord and wind from

the dark mountain didn’t blow.

The best women too lost patience and took the tram home

to mum and dad waiting for you to grow up.

At 45, your parents begin dying the impossible happens and

you are a floating iceberg lost in a glass of whisky.

And just as wheels on suitcases are invented you grow up

polish you shoes and find that little cabin in a hidden valley

it has a leaking roof and has been waiting just for you.

the racial issue

the racial issue

the village | Write Out Loud

the village | Write Out Loud

The Village

 When I came to this
small village in the interior of Algarve

there were animals’ mules and pigs and children played in

the road, barking dogs and chicken looking for worms and

I dreamt of becoming a rustic poet recording a vanishing

way of life. The change came so quick the children became

adults moved to Lisbon tractor instead of mules and we grew

old as letters of refusal piled up I married a hypochondriac

who faints when I inject insulin into my stomach.

It was not to be like this she should be by my side when

I received prizes and the applause was for her to enjoy.

I thought it would be easy people would buy my work go

and be more moral and my poetry would be jewels of love.

Balderdash! The truth is I`m happy to be alive the dream

belonged to someone else an idiot I used to know, 

black shiny shoes

Black, Shiny Shoes.  

The EU dictatorship has crushed Hellas Germany and the banks won-

The French to their helped the Greeks writing a new tax system and

for once the tycoons have to pay tax as well and for the Hellenic

people they need not buy new shoes every fortnight, let the cobblers

 mend your shoes. I remember a time when buying shoes was a major

 investment, they were always black and bought on credit book.

You may call it thrift I will call it poverty when you are poor everything

cost more as the Greeks soon will soon notice. And in case you wonder

the money the loans go straight to the lenders banks and one wonder

who many times they have to pay for the airport in Athens a German

steel company built? The Greeks are hard working people, with bad elite,

the next one to will be Portugal, Italy too are feeling the clammy hand of

capitalism and then it will be France`s turn to taste rigour.

What about EU then?

surplus to eequierment

Surplus to requirement

My wife was her aunt a lovely woman of forty-four,

then she divorced her husband a man with a title,

a baron, because she felt bored by him – he was

tedious all style and  a small brain- she took a

course and got a medical job that brought her far and

wide, in the world and she also got a new man and

we were happy for her, she was approaching middle

age entitled to some happiness

She stopped ringing us and when my wife rang her

 she was always busy, she disappeared from view

and the silence became a chasm on unsaid words

But we know she is doing well has friends her age.

I said to my wife last time we saw her she looked

so remote we had become too old for her

  

an unfashionable opinion

an unfashionable opinion

Why do we let this happening these endless lies and distortion

of history and without shame wrapping themselves in the bloody

bandage of victimhood they are special and we must not think

otherwise to upset an historic  untrue yet also a truth.

Mass killing is wrong twenty million Russians lost their life but this

 is smoothed over it is the magic number of the seven million we

have to remember and atone for But why were they singled out,

what make them different from other Russians other than their

refusal to be absorbed by Russia. to be at one in the culture and

a country the temporarily  dwelled in.

 A Jewish person is only true to his tribe the rest is a pretence.

Because the Jews are despite their European veneer just another

Middle Eastern tribe trying to dominate the region. 

confession

confession

The Disappearing act

Hellas has vanished from Europe, they are looking

 here and there but it
cannot be found on any map.

Banks are in a frenzy they have lent money to

to a Greek tragedy an illusion, the only thing left is

“A Big Fat Wedding” a movie played by Jewish actors.

A trick of the eye grapes on the vine is a chimera and

Germany is taking a haircut.

the disapproving act

The Disappearing act

Hellas has vanished from Europe, they are looking

 here and there but it cannot be found on any map.

Banks are in a frenzy they have lent money to

to a Greek tragedy an illusion, the only thing left is

“A Big Fat Wedding” a movie played by Jewish actors.

I trick of the eye grapes on the vine is a chimera and

Germany is taking a haircut.

the plot

The Plot

It was after eight o`clock in the evening before it got cool

enough to go for a little drive my interest the savannah

like grass made golden by the falling sun, it was then I saw

the eyes of lions keeping an eye on me. Lions around here

 are not bigger than a cat you can take one home but it

scratches your furniture is untidy and bite.

I had a beautiful girlfriend, let me hastily add years ago,

she was intensely jealous going out with her was an ordeal

I had to look at her or the table it was like she wanted to be

inside of my eyes to see what I saw.

One day she broke up with me and slammed the door shut,

her friend came asked me to take her home since it was dark.

She invited me for a coffee suspecting foul play said no thanks

The day after I dried my feet on the town`s doormat took

the bus down to the coast and re- joined the merchant navy.

 I dint’s come near the place for years. Yes, I learned then it had

been a sordid little plot.     

It is beautiful driving around her as the shadows get longer

I stop the bike and the stillness is beautiful nature doesn’t

play tricks it just is and I`m not burdened by age this evening

and there are no poisonous snakes here.

how long is a life time

how long is a life -time

A life Time

How long is a lifetime it cannot be measured in years

my brother died young yet left behind five children

and I was born a weakling – he will never grow old

doctors said- weak heart and pacemaker, I’m kept alive

by modern medical science and have lived to get old.

I know the end can strike anytime anywhere, but I will

not think about it. However, long my life -time it has been

short as I leave nothing behind to be remembered for

“As my father said”, a made up lie, no one will have to

make up stories about me  

Great American literature

Great American Literature

Our book shelf groaned under the weight

of American Literature and my mother was

principally a communist.

An American Tragedy I read at fourteen,

and my fascination with A bridge over San Louis Ray

was endless, and so it went on.

I joined the youth wing of the communist party

of Norway, it lasted a month, they kicked me out

I knew too much to be useful.

The plight of the poor concern me I bristle when

seeing injustice in short I will fling my arms around

a horse that is about to be flogged yet one doesn`t

need to be a communist for this. Kindness is not

political and doesn’t carry a flag you have to pledge

allegiance to, a friendly smile will suffice. 

when news was easy

when news was easy

When The News was Easy

Most of us know more now than we did before when news

was simpler such as Soviet Union-bad- and Mao in China   

swam across the river I have just been reading about Sinai

 a place I thought
consisted of sand, goats and Bedouins on

white horses, but there has been a slow war there going

back a long time. We didn’t and were not told that Islam has

 many aspects and
sects – just like us- and there is fighting

 amongst them, usually
about power and money, religions is

the glue that binds together the rest. The young Muslims in

Europe, who go to fight for IS they are fooled into
believing

they fight for a cause and the will be dispensed of when no

longer needed. In Sunnis eye they are foreigners.

 We live in paralysed
world we don’t which way to sway do

let us follow the money whoever is in power.    

meeting an old friend

Meeting a Friend

I met my old friend Joao at the pharmacist today

a place we old ones go to buy medicine and to

meet friends still alive, it occurred to me the pharmacy

and the cemetery is only five minutes, walk away

from each other. Joao had gone thin he used to be

a house builder with a big muscular frame and now

before me an old man who had lost his ready smile

and a funny riposte to any argument.

But I saw something else in his eyes, a dread, it was

as he realised the finality of his life, a pleading to

to nature that he was the one who escaped to

the paradise island where the word death does not

exist in the local language of the tribe who live there,

but there was no succour; he had lost the battle. 

POET ROAD

A  Poet Road

Now that it is hot and the sun has turned from

a warm friend to a raging enemy, what did I say

to make it so burning hot?

 I`m up early and drive around stop and take

pictures of growing plants before the rampant

sun makes them lose all colours.

Then before I know it is ten o’clock and time to

sit indoors watching the miserable news

and trivial entrainment programs.

The bush fires of terror are something we have to

live with until we learn to clear the undergrowth

and when needed...brutally weed.

I’m thinking of a man who has a small field of

the greenest vines and every day he tends lovingly

his bushes, you see we should not be too kind.

On the other hand, we cannot poison the land

with pesticide just to save a plant we like, and

forgetting that all life has its place.   

    

The Undying soul

The Undying soul

changing class

Changing Class

Sitting around a table laden down with pints of beer and

football was discussed, I got up and walked home.

A navy academy accepted me I studied English at home

and had a private tutor for math taught by a girl who

loved me, two years it took it could have been longer but

I wanted to change my life, so much so I changed the way

I spoke, which on reflection was a mistake as I ended up

speaking stilted and my natural irony and humour was shy

but not for all time. So there I was a purser on a liner, 3 silver

stripes  having supper with the rich and I found the especially

boring forever talking about real estate.

I had to be social dance and often fuck one of the widows on

the cruise. Back home I was a misfit I didn’t belong anywhere

I used to say I was classless, that is not true.

My loneliness drove me to drink and finally, sleeping rough

rejected by two classes, until I saw the light, and borrowed

money- from my mother to buy a typewriter.    

Jobsekers

Jobsekers

Job Seekers

After being unemployed for a long time I got

a job as a cook in a cafe where people came

for the beer, but the local law demanded

drinkers had to order something to eat before

drinking. Usually it was a burger or a cheese

sandwich. If a sandwich came back uneaten

it was moved to another plate and served again,

but I had to open look under the cheese to be

sure no one had put something there, like

the butt of cigarette and so on.  I knew the game

having been a drinker there until I lost my job

of putting a lid on tins of sardines and mackerel.

 To be working class
when time is good is Ok, but

but sooner or later there will be a downturn

and without proper education poverty beckons. 

Jobsekers

Jobsekers

Job Seekers

After being unemployed for a long time I got

a job as a cook in a cafe where people came

for the beer, but the local law demanded

drinkers had to order something to eat before

drinking. Usually it was a burger or a cheese

sandwich. If a sandwich came back uneaten

it was moved to another plate and served again,

but I had to open look under the cheese to be

sure no one had put something there, like

the butt of cigarette and so on.  I knew the game

having been a drinker there until I lost my job

of putting a lid on tins of sardines and mackerel.

 To be working class
when time is good is Ok, but

but sooner or later there will be a downturn

and without proper education poverty beckons. 

the Neighbour

Your Neighbour

All the wrongs done

by these people of strangeness

will be their right

and if you think they are wrong

you will be punished.

ghosts

Ghosts

When I wake up a two in the morning

I hear his one hoof slipping on the cobbled

it didn’t use to be like that it was a sandy lane

easy to walk on but inland tourism is big now

hence the uneven stones, he stops outside my

house I shiver in the heat, but then he walks on

chuckling darkly he has the comic timing of

a comedian who hates his audience, himself and

the whole fucking world.

Sleep impossible I walk barefoot into the kitchen

open the fridge a cold beer never fails to bring

coolness and a rethink, but I sense shadows around

my desk when I look up only cold air blows and

my contempt for my ghosts is total never do the have

the courage to show their face