a bowl of tranquillity
a
bowl of blueberries
plump and placid
with a spritz of cinnamon sugar
in cereal
is a fine way to start the day
*
I don’t know what Jesus ate along the way —
it wasn’t figs !!!!
but I imagine Buddha had a bowl
to begin each day
rubbing his tummy with pleasure
The Drunken Sunflower.
Look at you.
Lurching to the left like a drunken sunflower.
Perhaps you’re losing yr elasticity.
I know what that’s about.
Every now and then while I’m writing, I reach across
& straighten you up
so yer young and springy
like you were
when my granddaughter first crocheted you
& sent you across.
Content Notes: This poem touches on difficult emotions and mental health themes.
Lifeboat
It’s yer dark night of the soul.
The wild, ravenous waters.
You’re on yer own.
A lifeboat appears.
Doesn’t matter if it’s not doctrinally right.
It’s yer lifeboat, for God’s sake.
Get in.
Whatever gets you through the night.
The Circle
Friday.
Doughnut day.
Pentecostal Peter day.
Meet my mates at the pub day.
T Chow’s and dining, eat all you want day.
Thirty years in we’re still friends.
We’re going to the end now.
The circle will not be broken.
Complimentary coffees and ports,
hugs and kisses outside,
the warmth of human bodies.
But we’re oldies, get home at
the ungodly hour of ten.
You can’t burn the candle at both ends.
Kiss Curl
I woke up this morning
with a Bill Hayley kiss curl
looking back at me —
Were they making a comeback?
Coco Jones. Dua Lipa, Serena Willams.
Was I on track? Surfing the zeitgeist?
I looked so sharp, so retro.
I was a kid again off to see ‘Blackboard Jungle’
with its Bill Hayley soundtrack in the summer of ’55.
It had begun.
A Surrealist Romp : to Bob *
My poems could be more like your poems
if I gave them full rein
but I’d be a little worried I might not
see them again;
you’ve tasted freedom, you know what it’s like
as you whiz along past Saturn’s rings
on your hippy one-eyed bike
* Naïve Haircuts
Downtown Girl
Met a girl in a downtown bar
Shannon was her name.
I did a little jig. She laughed
& asked me why I came.
I’ve come to have some magic
sprinkled in my ears.
I hear there’s a hot little band
that I’d like to hear.
Yes, she said, We play old songs.
I play electric violin.
ahhh, I say, like that Dylan song.
I bought when I was sweet sixteen.
Can you play me ‘Shannon?’ I said.
It’s yr namesake’s song.
So I called it up on YouTube
& we sang along.
The band played it soft
the lights were dimmed
and I heard that sad little story
all over again.
how the little dog swam out
because he loved the sea
but he never did come back
to his family
and Henry Gross wrote that song
that she sang to me
Poor Henry released fifteen albums.
That was his only hit.
He took that song everywhere.
I love it to bits.
* pic by pinterest
Sea Shanties
When I’m in my bath I sing sea shanties
and see mermaids in their scanties
but I look away as a good boy should —
is that a bear I see in the woods? —
and let my skiff go, go, go
as the winds of Imagination blow
Wobbly
I took a little walk this New Years’ Day.
The air was bright and buzzy; I was on my way.
You’re a little wobbly, one neighbour said,
and behind your sunnies, your eyes are quite red.
Yes, I am a little tipsy, though I drank mainly beer;
okay, and a few glasses of red; anyhow, good cheer.
Hope you didn’t drive, that stuff goes to your head.
No, I didn’t drive. I was driven, I turned back and said.
The Wrong Tree
I go outside. I’m like a dog off the leash ,
striding down main street under the muted sun,
frothy clouds scudding across the sea-blue sky
like algal bloom.
Whoa, tone it down, mate !
It’s like lockdown,
this heat,
when you could only go outside
if you walked yer dog..
and I am:
the dog I’m walking is me —
only I don’t bark at bad neighbours anymore —
the old couple burning trash on washing day,
Larry and the leaf blower desecrating the Sabbath ….
Jesus and the Buddha taught me that.
But I can still manage to bark up
the wrong tree.
John Malone 
You must be logged in to post a comment.