DO YOU THO ?

i give afternoon tv

all the progress

the mornings fresh air 

gave me

it fills the spaces
i cant look at

with stories 

i wont believe

& while i grant it
credit & thanks

i know its a tool box
& never a church

MY AI DOWNLOADED YOUR DEEPFAKE

i absorbed you all 

into my monkey ether
over those 1000 hour

i auto-logged your voices
for no-choice alone reruns

youre in my habit
my satchel
& my epaulettes

its a scientific haunting

the past is a ghost

i am a history church

a bug ridden airbrush

powdering the glitches 

from computerhope.com

THE PLANET OF SLUMS

CARDBOARD DREAMING

those

poor

carbon

stacks

delegated

an

unbelievable

unrelatable

shitarse

nothing

trapped

by

economics

in the

sad bad acres

of landfill ghetto

on

this

planet of slums

well they dream of having dreams

under polythene and pollution

on biodegradable cardboard sheets

OLYMPIC BULLDOZER

remember when

the bulldozers came ?

and flattened

our awful shacks ?

remember when

the olympics came ?

and they built that wall

to hide us from the road ?

no ?

too busy trying

to fuel

basic metabolism functions ?

me too me too

tho i always wondered

if those bulldozers

they got souls ?

and i feel for them

i mean made for building

werent they ?

and

look

what

they

had

to

do

whats that ?

the drivers you say ?

fuck em

theyre where

civil disobedience

should start

PASS THE BRANDY

theres a purity in being poor

dont you think ?

the simple life

of a frugal man

its got a ring to it

dont you think ?

imagine owning like two things ?

that must be liberating

dont you think ?

like being a monk i imagine

i mean if they

really wanted out

well theyd do something

about it wouldnt they ?

they must LIKE it there

dont you think ?

i can empathise in a way

i mean the waiting list

for bentleys these days

i blame the russians

dont you ?

well come on

pass the brandy

tarquin old chap

i cant face

the stables and mother sober

ARISTOCUNTS

and we cherish them

dont we ?

its our culture

isnt it ?

the races

afternoon tea

ski chalets

the boys club

daddys off-shore

the estate

the penthouse

butlers

maids

stable boys

an ancient groundskeeper

pheasants

foxes

stiff upper lips

backbone

harmless isnt it ?

like

a

costume

drama

like when we had india

MIDDLE

and the

royal-crazy mentalists

on the

low rungs

and the

professional clusterfuck

in the

madness middle

they

defend

the

world

above

them

preserve it

its their dream

all sure

they got some

blue blood somewhere

and

they

all

want

pity

for being left out

a guiltless way in

and never having

to look down

again

at those

trapped

down there

by

economics

on our

planet of slums

from amazon.com

7 PM POPS

7PM

eating from a bag of chips
in a hillside graveyard

7pm

the dirt piled under the turf
creeps
up
the
ivy held walls

theres crumble cracks here
in turrets of pointed cement

and green has collected 
in the flakes
in the corners
of the iron gates

their seams thick and rounded
with a hundred weatherproof coats 

and i find a shallow step 
to sit on
to stretch on

awkward like i fell there

in the 1898 & 1924
headstone shadows
of 
a 
vacant church halls 
yellow window squares



SECRET

the high street is spread
like a map 
below me

and i feel like a secret

up high
eating alone

on ground fat
with the dead



FOXES

and i feel like
an invisible feeder
a retired predator
separate forever 

from the hatchback turnover

and i feel like this
to the baby wails
that night foxes cry
like angels who fell

and cannot climb home



LANDFILL

theyre somewhere off away behind me
on landfill that rolls 
under grass like felt

like muscles under cotton

off
into
the scrappy marsh of quicksands
and
twisting creeks of stranded boats

sat unnatural and stationary 
the colour of allotment sheds 

and dotted like beacons
are teenagers used up 

dirt bike 

skeletons

essex salt marsh from the air by terry whittaker 2020/vision/rex

VICTORIA AVENUE

  how 
  my 
meat tower balances itself 
on 
hearsay 
pale legs 
knees of fire

  how 
  my 
water brain builds reality 
from
wallpaper
denim 
blockpaving 

  how 
  the 
abyss stays beneath
the 
citalopram 
bath tub 
dirt line

these are things i ponder - ego distraction 
                            amateur analysis
in 
an 
escaping dusk
as
i
haunt familiar avenues
with
ear phones in and pod on shuffle
and
no expression at all - foot then other foot 
                       is all enough for me

noticing 
railway terraces 
  of old brick
closed churches 
  of graffiti boards
thin alleys 
  winding up hill
dead banks 
  shut eyes
new builds 
  vain glass
and
plastic fencing
  putting wood
  out of a job

  that
  i 
hardly really ever 
noticed 
before

from www.primelocation.com

SUPERMARKET CAFE POPS

1.

  the 
  old stone church tower 
  up on the marsh hill
is
always
aroused 

  pushing its godhead
up
over
the
shopping cement sprawl 

  that
diminishes
its symbol
  but never its 
  hard
  architecture


2.

  never looking up
are
the
mice men 
rat boys
and eyebrow girls

  busy
  with
  plastic
  and fries

  never looking up 


3.

under 
steel and glass
i sip my coffee
and
i count my pains
  in
  the
  indoor muted hubbub
  the
human highway has become


3.

in a fuckchain foodhouse 
i
eat a sandwich / tastes of packing foam
and
write
some more tesco-ftown-meh-drek
thats
like
sitting doing awkward shitting 

  laying behind me
  a 
  dump 
  that still itches deep
  when 
  i am
  done

 from photolibra.com

LONG STORY SHORT

once upon 
a 
winter morning 

the sun was open peace
and 
the air was cold candy
when
we
met
in
a
church basement
of 
street sadness 
and 
organised optimism

she 
patted the wooden chair next to her
with
a
mitten paw 

and
afterwards

we went for coffee

and
decided

  to
  be
  nice


    to
    each 
    other 


      for
      ever

 from urban75.org