Tag: Poems

You, my love, are something rare,
With lovely eyes and silky hair.
And though you sometimes burn the toast,
It’s you, my darling, I love the most.

I love you more than my air fryer,
Though sometimes it’s a close-run thing.
You are my heart’s eternal fire,
My queen, my love, my everything.

And if the house were burning down,
I’d save you first, my precious flower.
But could you grab the fryer, dear?
It’s covered for another year.

You caught me whispering one night,
“Your chips are simply out of sight.”
You said, “You never talk to me
With quite that much sincerity.”

I said, “It’s merely stainless steel,
It cannot love, it cannot feel.
It doesn’t laugh or shed a tear,
Or whisper sweet nothings in my ear.”

Now love is built on give and take,
On tenderness and birthday cake.
On holding hands through joy and strife,
And sharing all the chips of life.

And when we’re old and turning grey,
And all our youthful charms decay,
I’ll hold your hand beside the fire,
And promise to unplug the fryer.

But should you leave me, heaven forbid,
I’ll sit beside its plastic lid,
And whisper through my falling tears,
“You’ve never failed me all these years.”

So take my hand, my love, my dear,
We’ll share our love through thick and thin.
And if you really love me too…

Please put the frozen chips back in.

She wore her silky nightdress,
With a sparkle in her eye,
And whispered, “Talk dirty to me,”
As I loosened up my tie.

She pulled me close and murmured,
“Say something filthy, dear,”
So I told her how the kitchen bin
Had leaked for half a year.

She said, “Oh, be more daring!
I want to hear you swear!”
I said, “The bloody oven’s broke,
And there’s cobwebs everywhere!”

She purred, “I want you naughty,
I want you crude and rough.”
I said, “The toilet’s overflowing,
And the plumbing’s had enough!”

She said, “I want it hotter!”
Her breathing getting fast.
I said, “The fridge is overheating,
I don’t think it’s going to last!”

She cried, “Oh, give me passion!
Come on, you sexy brute!”
I said, “There’s something growing
In your favourite walking boot.”

She said, “You drive me crazy!”
I said, “I thought as much,
There’s something dead behind the stove
I’ve been too scared to touch!”

Now love’s a funny business,
And romance can be tough,
She asked me to talk dirty,
So I told her filthy stuff.

I thought I’d be seductive,
So I mentioned rotting food,
But apparently a blocked-up drain
Doesn’t get a woman in the mood!

At ninety-nine, old Albert Brown
Was quite the local catch,
He had his teeth, his own two hips,
And trousers that still matched.

He took his pills, could climb the stairs,
And rarely wet the bed.
He knew the names of all the girls,
And most of them weren’t dead.

The ladies at the nursing home
Would swoon when he walked past,
For Albert had a working heart,
And one that beat quite fast.

He’d dance with Doris after tea,
Play bingo next to Jean,
And Mavis swore she’d never met
A man so full of beans.

Then in walked lovely Margaret,
A sprightly ninety-three.
She had her teeth, her hips, her hair,
And made a decent tea.

He took her hand and whispered low,
“My darling, you’re divine.
Shall we spend our golden years
In your room, love, or mine?”

And now they share a double room,
Their love still feels brand-new.
But every morning Albert asks,
“Excuse me, who are you?”

I have a cabinet of tools,
Who rarely challenge any rules.
The hammer heads up law and order,
The tape measure controls the border.

My foreign minister’s a hoe,
Who hasn’t anywhere to go.
The secateurs control defence,
And keep the neighbours off the fence.

On Tuesdays I inspect the troops,
Three spiders marching round in loops.
The mower’s joined the rebel cause,
The gnome demands a change of laws.

I issue medals made of foil,
For loyal service on the soil.
I wear a sash of baler twine,
And drink warm squash like vintage wine.

But yesterday, at half past three,
A revolution came for me.
The gnome advanced with garden peas,
The spiders swarmed around my knees.

The mower roared—to my surprise!
A cloud of smoke obscured my eyes.
They seized my throne, my rake, my crown,
And passed a vote to bring me down.

They marched me to the compost heap,
And told me that’s where I must sleep.
My wife appeared and said, “You clot,
Have you been drinking quite a lot?”

I stood before her, proud and brave,
A statesman facing an early grave.
“My government has been betrayed!
My loyal servants have all strayed!”

She looked inside my little shed,
Then shook her weary, puzzled head.
“You’re sixty-three, you daft old fool.
Get in the house. Your tea’s gone cool.”

And now I sit, a king deposed,
My empire lost, my borders closed.
But hear me, rebels, every one—
My political career is not yet done!

For down behind the water butt,
Beyond the hedge, beside the hut,
I’ve found a place to make my stand…

I’m now the President of Compostland!

I say, “It’s rather complex,”
When I haven’t got a clue,
Then add, “We need a paradigm,”
And everyone says, “True.”

I nod at other people’s charts,
I frown at every graph,
And when they ask me what I think,
I give a knowing laugh.

I speak of shifting landscapes,
Of frameworks and of change,
And use “interdisciplinary”
To make the obvious seem strange.

I went upon a podcast
To discuss the price of bread,
And talked about “the wider picture”
Till the presenter scratched his head.

They asked me once for evidence,
I found this rather rude.
I said, “You’re missing nuance,”
In a slightly injured mood.

I’ve written seventeen reports,
All wonderfully obscure,
And each concludes, “More work is needed,”
Though why, I’m not quite sure.

The government has called me in
To help them make a plan.
I haven’t understood a word,
But neither has the man.

So should you need an expert,
Don’t bother studying hard;
Just wear a look of grave concern
And print a business card.

For knowledge has its limits,
And facts can be a bore,
But nonsense said with confidence
Will always earn you more.

There was a time when wisdom came
From years of toil and thought,
When knowledge was a precious thing
That had to first be taught.

But now the world has moved along,
We’ve found a quicker way,
Just watch a clip, absorb a bit,
And lecture folk all day.

The doctor studied seven years,
The surgeon studied ten,
But Kevin knows a better way—
He watched a bloke called Ben.

He knows the cause of every ill,
From dandruff down to gout,
And if the experts disagree,
He simply shouts them out.

Our Sandra’s now a therapist,
She read a Facebook post,
And diagnoses everyone
While buttering her toast.

“You’re narcissistic, Uncle Jim,
And Dad’s got OCD!”
But mention Sandra’s drinking and
She’ll say, “Don’t lecture me!”

Young Darren’s into finance now,
He trades in crypto schemes,
He calls himself an entrepreneur
With seven income streams.

He’s lost his wages three times round,
His overdraft’s a wreck,
But says he’s nearly wealthy now—
Just waiting for a cheque.

And Doris knows the climate’s fine,
She’s lived for eighty years,
She’s seen some snow in April,
So she laughs at scientists’ fears.

“The planet’s always changing, dear,
It’s nothing new to me!”
Then wonders why her roses bloom
In early February.

We all have grand opinions
On the things we do not know,
We shout them from the rooftops
And refuse to let them go.

We cannot fix a dripping tap,
Or make the printer print,
But give us world affairs to solve,
We’ll offer every hint.

The facts are merely obstacles,
The truth a point of view,
And evidence is optional
When confidence will do.

Why waste your time with learning
When conviction wins the day?
A loud enough opinion
Makes the facts just fade away.

And somewhere sits a quiet soul
Who’s studied all his life,
Who knows that every answer
Brings uncertainty and strife.

He weighs the facts, admits his doubts,
And cautiously says, “Perhaps…”
But no one hears his wisdom
Through the thunderous verbal scraps.

For certainty is fashionable,
And doubt has lost its crown,
The loudest fool’s a genius
If he shouts the others down.

We’ve all become authorities,
With expertise to spare,
We know about the whole wide world
Without once going there.

And if you think I’m talking rot,
Or question what I say,
I’ve read three posts this morning—
So I’m an expert, anyway!

I have nothing more to say
except goodbye—

though even that
is only a door
pretending to be a word.

Something has already crossed over.
Something without a name
has taken the shape of distance.

I have nothing more to say.

Only this small sound
shimmering through eternity,

goodbye—

and somewhere beyond it,

no word at all.

I am older now—
too careful with words,
too skilled at folding pain into politeness.
The years have become a tide clock:
ebb, work, sleep, repeat.
I forget entire summers
and remember only their invoices.

I have begun to lose nouns:
the names of birds,
the taste of a certain afternoon.

But verbs remain—
to breathe, to ache, to forgive.
When I walk, I still hear
the child’s shoes slapping through puddles,
echoes inside the bone—
maybe that is enough.

Time edits gently,
crossing out in pencil, not ink.
Even forgetting feels like snowfall,
a soft covering,
a mercy for what was too sharp to keep.

You collect smooth stones, name clouds,
believe the moon follows only you home.
Keep that foolishness—
there is a kindness in being wrong.
One day you’ll trade it for precision,
and precision has no mercy.

You sound tired.
Do you not still run in the rain?
Even old hearts have rooms for puddles.
If you’re lonely, you can borrow mine—
it’s small,
but it fits light.

I write this to no one,
and to every version of myself.
The ink runs as rain will.
Somewhere, a child is still laughing,
and I am still learning
how to answer.

Sometimes I walk past the station
just to watch departures.
I imagine you somewhere coastal,
hair salted, voice roughened by distance.
I’ve kept your mug—
it stains the same way mine does.

Do you still think of the bridge,
the one we never crossed?

Yes. Every night.
It hums behind the noise of trains
and new conversations.
The bridge was shorter than I feared—
but what a long fall, afterwards.
I’ve learned to pack lightly,
to sleep without roots.
Sometimes, mid-laughter,
I hear the echo of your quiet life
and envy its stillness.

The sea is not freedom,
only motion that never decides.

If we met again,
we would recognise the same ache
expressed in different tenses—
you, the present; me, the perpetual leaving.
Two mirrors angled to infinity,
each reflecting what the other
almost became.

The screen sleeps in my palm,

a small, indifferent moon.

Three dots bloom, then vanish—

a tide that forgets to come in.

I scroll through the last thing you said,

as if re-reading could change the ending.

 

Outside, the day goes on performing itself:

traffic, a pigeon, a leaf giving up.

Inside, time slows to a buffering wheel,

spinning on the edge of almost.

 

There’s a grammar to this quiet—

ellipsis, unsent draft,

the faint electric ache of maybe.

 

When your reply finally lands,

it says nothing extraordinary—

just hey, sorry—

but the world exhales,

and the moon in my hand

brightens again,

like it never learned to wait.