Illumination.

for Rosemary Harries.

Artists are escapists.

We don't care much for 'real'. 

Whatever nature delivers, 

we want to improve the deal. 

So we'll shift the light and shade, 

and reparse to re-enlighten. 

We can damn the 'drear' to darken. 

We can gild and shine and brighten. 

Sure! We can appreciate 

a well-formed natural state. 

Yet oft', we'll ache to change the script 

or even wipe the slate. 

Facing charges of presumptuousness 

from anal analytics. 

We'll contend that nature made us, 

to be nature's 'natural' critics.

Spy Wear And Tear.

Not a thing escapes
the electronic eye.
The cameras on old crossroad posts,
the satellites in the sky.
The Akashic record data cloud
that snaps and traps it all,
when you sneak a cigarette
or piss behind a wall.
Not long ago; yet light years passed,
we'd get up to no good.
Smoke weed behind the bike shed,
frolic naked in the wood.
Flick the bird behind a Copper,
paint 'the team' name on a train.
Stupid, lousy things we did,
before the electric brain.
Now we scan the edge of buildings,
watch above for listening drones.
Make our P's and Q's PC prose;
phobia de microphones.
Liberte! Egalitere!
La Utopia absurde!
Caged in constant observation.
Ever seen and ever heard.

Conjunction.

In the late twilight,
when the last bird call is fading.
When the last rodent scuttles
to it's nest.
When the last spider
has crawled into it's crevice.
When the pointed reflections
of reed grass blades,
are moon shone silvery.
And appear as
hung polished swords,
under the inky
surface of the still
chilling pond.
And the flickering space station
slides beneath Venus,
in the dusty blue velvet sky.
I wonder what brought us together?
And I wonder why.

NOW THAT WE UNDERSTAND MAGIC
as just an old name, for science.
We may enter the realms of the occult,
in contemptuous defiance.
We may smirk at the wailing Incantor.
We may scoff, the be-robed, incense reeker.
And tell them that gravitational waves
are now the trek lands, of the seeker.
And that since all is mere pulsation,
quantified, categorical clutter.
We may measure, define; reshape, realign,
without prayer or blessing to mutter.
Now that we have means to measure;
the method, and the math.
To plot all machinations of matter
in a holomorphic graph:
What price the old Seer's prediction,
when from greatest unto least,
we may track each slight vibration,
in the information feast?
For now we weave patterns of light.
And now we dance energy fields.
So we re-polarise, and deftly devise,
new claws, to expand our yields.
We may call forth entire Universes,
at the stroke of a violin string.
We may harmonise chords of star sound,
with our very own song to sing.
For ages the Sages did ponder,
as to how to turn lead into gold.
But with quantum mechanics,
and dimension dynamics, we may reach,
for something more bold.

Now that the screens are parting;
revealing form altering tricks.
We may re-heat the cranial Cauldron,
and gather fruits for the mix.
And seem to unravel the mystery,
of old allegorical Alchemy.
Mutative elements, transforming the whole.
The Earth, the body; and the soul.
Atoms and molecules all realign.
Ingredients, in our Cauldron design.
But for effect and to impress,
let us play with ... 'esoteric ness.'
Adorning science's driven wedge,
with an eebie-jeebie, cutting edge.
And seek by stealth to forge the fusion
of illusory myth, and mythical illusion.
Preserving idea's of mystery,
which science has damned to history.
So let us be seen, collecting things;
The DNA of long dead Kings.
Mushrooms and ergots
to dance in the dreams,
and rusting swords
from old sacrifice streams.
Flickering glints from Fairy wings
and waves of wandering devotions.
Policies for policing parks;
the throats of nightingales and larks,
theories on wheel less carts,
and essences of ancient potions.
Time zones to be turned about,
atomic structure inside out.
Mislaid apothecary tools,
pale reflections from shallow pools.
And universal lightless stuff,
without denomination.
For all can change, from out of the blue.
We hold this knowledge as totally true;
in infinite, imagination.

In a mind storming Cauldron of energies,
let the bubbles and billows blow.
To where streams of unseen waves deliver,
the sets and scripts for the show.
Into the brain pan, go fables and stories,
lies and versions, fiction and facts.
Plots of play for entertainment,
ponderous prologues and stark final acts.
Stir in a sumptuous future.
Stir in a past that is frugal.
Stir them all in a gravity wash
of forces centrifugal.
Let us add everything to the blend
so we may wander worlds without end,
stirring into the pot that steams
the meta programmed spices of dreams.
Elements of spatial time,
discrete, replete and introspective.
Pottages of preferment, eclectic and selective.
Mimic old wars against patterns of stars,
on painted sets and awnings.
All the dancing faeries.
All the screeching scaries.
Shadows of mind, that are shifting shapes,
Moulded into mummery japes.
Images, all of the play makers art.
As emotional contusions
mark the fading of delusions,
And plot the emotive charts,
that resonate the hearts.
For here is a Prince in a state of duress.
Here is a Damsel, in distress.
Yearning for love and a tender caress,
when the dew beads the rose in the morning.

Let sleight of hand and crass deception
settle the sceptics shallow perception.
And don the robes of starry weave,
but hide a Rabbit in the sleeve.
So costume the canting clerics
to lend to their performance,
the creepiness of dainty dress;
and delicate adornance.
And hail their 'spiritual' hysterics
in vaulted halls festooned with relics.
Rhythmically rattle the appellant prattle,
bleat with the sheep and low with the cattle.
Resonate the repetitions.
Bombard the minds with guilt.
List the failures and attrition's,
then gather in the Gelt.
You'll be forgiven, ain't that nice?
And enter heaven, at a price.
Praise the mythical old stories
with enlightened calm respect.
Just hint', that we know them from study,
of the old Sumerian texts.
For blessed are they that lack vision
into the patterns of mind.
And accept that myth delivered as fact
will serve to keep them in line.
For as that which blooms in shade
is protected by the cover;
minds sensitive to light
live to grow as sense of other.

Magic is that which we do not know,
and what we know not of; we fear.
Few are adventuring Hereticals
who would wipe the mysteries clear.
True magic is a dazzling dance
of seven drifting veils.
Each veil has seven Dragon forms.
Each Dragon seven tails.
For 'All' is Magic in Hermetic law.
No thing is wasted in energy flow.
All that is Magic is of the Mind,
the engine of mentation.
For nought is believed or even perceived
without small deliberation.
The ingredients of the conjure broth,
the defined apportionate list;
needs be known by Mind, in image or kind
in order to exist.
As above so below,
as is near, is as far.
How vast or how minute
is yonder, twinkling star?
An amoeba spiral in the sand,
a Galactic whirl in the sky.
Evince the Correspondence law
in witness to the eye.
Syntropical invaders
plundering through pasts.
Reforming by reflection
to ensure that nothing lasts.
Though seeming static nought is still,
and peace is a fond illusion.
A snapshot for the memory
from the Vibrant God's profusion.
And beyond any line, drawn in sand,
or axial point in disposition.
We may step into the looking glass
and reverse the polar condition.
Our happy place in time and space.
Where the monkey makes it's face.
Our fifty, fifty: One Inverse.
Our glass half emptyful.
A Qu bit opening many gates.
Determining infinite forms and fates.
Where all is still yet nothing rests.
Yet in the higher hidden planes;
the chargeless stringless broken branes,
the multifarious manifests.
So we roll with the rhythm,
in a midnight Mambo mood.
And we dance about the fire
in the mask of Bou Jaloud.
For we are as one
great beating heart.
Ever bound to never part.
If we sadly embrace a situation,
of scratchy scrapes, and sorry shapes;
in a banal cacophony, of background radiation.
Who would be of the neutral elect,
unfettered by cause or bound by effect?
Or nurture envy in rebellious wombs.
Carving the courses from cradles to tombs.
Mothering the mangy cur,
that dares to think;
that thinks to dare.
Fathering imperial process.
Gathering in the treasure.
To fuel the entropic Desire's
insatiable grasping of pleasure.

The worlds of stuff, real and imaged,
are the fields in which Magics play.
The signal waves of Nature,
lead us where they may.
To cast a spell, to manifest;
To prepare a magical potion .
We delve from a well of energies
in Nature's mighty ocean.
There we find, that human kind,
has writ, defined and recorded,
the patterns ;
that sweet Nature paints,
which hold the wisdom She has hoarded.
Let us then go with what we know,
to see what is earned
from what we have learned,
and boil up a fusion, of total inclusion.
The wisdom of the ages reveals no surprise,
that what we sought in youth,
in age we oft' despise.
The wisdom that set lightning rods
to channel the energies of the Gods.
Were magical means in their erection,
to organise demonic deflection.
And in fear we curdle our Cauldron stew
To discover an whole, world healing brew.
For on pondering the vastness
of infinite form,
how tiny we feel. Minuscule and forlorn.
Since with all our designs and devices deployed,
we barely are noticed out there in the void.
A non speaking part without personal art,
No name on the Bill! Won't be there at the kill.
For all we'll discover to boast to a lover,
is all our exploring gets tedious and boring.
We cover the ground but so little is found,
as we stumblingly bumblingly
reach stretch and grow,
just to discover how much we don't know.
Yet blessings of Aquinal angels,
are archetypal gifts we crave.
Diefically determining miracles,
And binding us as a slave.
To the grasping hope that there is after all,
a measure of infinity, we somehow can control.
Only hope spurs the drama, that by turns
is both glorious and tragic.
To light the path to the mysteries.
Now, that we understand Magic.

Pure Filth.

When the woollen industry died,
the reservoir that fed the old mill,
became disused.
The water meadow at its head
became a swamp.
Developers,
who want to build houses everywhere,
take one look at the quagmire,
sniff the stench fouled air, and walk away.
The channels are long blocked.
The drains are long broken.
So a freed, unmanaged, unmanacled nature;
binges on the anarchy of liberation,
brewing a brackish broth of sweet stagnation.

Children are warned to stay away
from the deadly, dangerous, disease
ridden slough.
Lest the Knucker Dragon, swamp devil,
swallow them whole.
Bulrushes,
point brown accusing fingers to the sky,
blaming the heavens for their
muddied becoming and placement.
Blood worm larvae,
orphaned Fly Nymphs,
ravenous in the root and stem of grasses;
greedily gorge without discrimination,
where cannibal repast; is often a relation.

Herons, are shadows that pass over,
heading for the cleaner waters below.
Snipe scutter
in the soft mire, poking for grubs.
Busily burying beaks in the
flowering Bogbean, and Hogweed:
Yellow Flag Iris,
and Ragged Robin,
rampantly roar a rich cacophony of colour.
Beady eyed, scruffy small,
fat water vole.
Mining leerdammer labyrinths in the banks,
faring fine on favoured vegetation,
prosperously multiply in stinking habitation.

Chaos Fearory.

Auramatic electronics,

Photosyncopathic sonics,

Asyncretic inharmonics

Propagating pandemonics.

You only need a bit of this

To know that ignorance is bliss.

Vulpine voluptuaries.

In Midwinter nights
I hear the Foxes
barking around their den.
It’s the mating season,
and Foxy passions
pour long shuddering
plaintiff purrs,
trebling snarls,
and arrested contralto yelps
through the saplings
and around the boughs
of the Sessile Oaks;
echoing in the hollowed
fallen Elm.
Vixen orgasmic squeals
and dog Fox baying rasps,
slice through the silence
of the midnight wood,
in a shameless show
of contemptuous,
copulative compulsion.
Their delirium of desire
drags the fecundate Foxes
from the frail reality
of sneaky, slinkiness
and shadowy shiftiness;
briefly into the winter realm
of braying brazen boldness.
As the invading frost
transforms the trees
into shining, crystalline,
towering talons of the Earth.
Honed to tear
at the icy grip
of chilling air.
This is the Springtime of Foxes.
A dark December night
is their bright May morn’.
This is their high time.
Their Golden Days
are silvery frozen nights,
when their nocturnal noisiness
screams, a sexual celebration
of survival.



I wrote a darker version of this. This is lighter. We need lightening up sometimes.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6NuhlibHsM

Art Is A Journey Of The soul

Art is a journey of the soul.
There is more to art than expression.
Expression can be instinct!
Art is the pursuit of perfection.

Somewhere Under The Rainbow.

I can see we are rapidly
approaching a time,
when thinking at all will be deemed
a hate crime.

Revaluations.

Every
thing
that may be
labelled
as divinity,
is neutralised;
check mated;
trumped,
by
infinity.

Identity theft.

Who and what are you?
Who and what am I?
We walk on a ball of mud
That spins in a churning sky.
Welcome to our convention
Wear this label on your breast
So that all may know you are categorised
And damned like all the rest.
For all must have a role to play
A purpose and a function,
From the first baptismal bathing
To the final extreme unction.
All must be deemed  a do-er,
And answer to ‘what do you do?’
Docketed dubbed, deemed and denoted
And moved to an orderly queue.
So tell me, are you a Princess?
A poet, a pleb’ or a Pope?
An aspirant apprentice,
Nothing yet; but live in hope?
Do you define yourself through others?
‘My Uncle met Obama.’
‘Lloyd George screwed my great grandmother.’
‘My Sis’ has a bar in Grenada.’
Vocations get disrupted.
That guy used to be a salesman,
But now he walks the Wolds
And writes articles for ‘The Dalesman.’
No more jobs for life now!
Just schizophrenic swapping
And we have to grin and bear it
And call it ‘career hopping’.
But the role that Nature gave us
Is one that we all still fit.
To convert carbohydrate and protein
And cover the Earth in shit.

The Ocean Of Dreams.

Into the ocean of dreams, I would willingly
sink again.
Snuggled in my cosy bed, listening
to the rain.
Each splattering splashing, droplet. Sending echoes
into the night.
Into the rustle and clatter of winds, and the star streaming rays
of light.
Deep into currents of darkness, I plunge in
purple pillows.
Down beneath, the cold surface of sense, where storms form
restless billows;
and tides of grasping existence, are thrashed upon
every shore.
But as I submerge to the depths, my mind will hold them
no more.
There in the empty darkness. There in oblivion’s
peace;
no worry demon stirs my mind, no striving
for release.
There, all is easily passing, to unreality …
drifting and gone.
However all seems? In the ocean of dreams; I know that all lives
to pass on.
No delusion of permanence lingers. No fixing of things
to endure:
No Angel or Devil; workload or revel, can rest on a foothold
that’s sure.
As every distant night noise; paints dream visions, that borrow
the sounds.
So an ambulance howling to danger, becomes a wild pack
of hounds.
The drone of distant warplanes, becomes a feasting
of bees.
And the laughter of a mermaid, is the sound of the wind
in the trees.
The bark of a dog in the farmyard, becomes the cough
of a Troll.
And the hoot of an owl in the coppice, is a
trebling Siren call.
The plaintiff lowing of cattle, is the singing of Welsh
mining men.
And the roar of a car on the moor road, is a tiger who growls
in his den.
The shrill of the first light birds, hail the dawn, as a
Seraphim choir.
And the morning milk float that rattles, is Apollo, at play
on his lyre.
Daylight comes shining, reality’s barbs, bite like a shower
of arrows.
The sounds and the visions replaced; with the mundane stuff,
of tomorrows.
As I rise and stretch, and open my ears, to a world full of engines
and screams;
willingly, would I sink again, into the ocean
of dreams.

Dropping Definition.

It is claimed the Eskimo,
has an hundred words for ‘snow’.
Whilst the British
only know
what ‘slush’ and ‘sleet’ is.
But on the Moorland roads,
snow is hailed
by many names.
Predominantly formed
of foul expletives!

Penumbra.

The darker green that swells in shade ‘neath sunlit
summer canopies,
is home to woodland creatures, of predatory need.
A battle for survival with all living things at rival,
is the state of raw existence, where concealed creatures
feed.

The brighter light that gleams and glares ‘neath lofty
city rooftops,
is home to urban spirits of a predatory side.
Where everything’s on sale, there’s the smell of something stale.
And truth is a blind stranger, where the hungry eyed
abide.

The dank occluded gnosis ‘neath the screening of
the senses,
is home to falsehood fantasy, that disseminate deception.
Ignorance and contradiction, in a constant painted fiction,
frustrate the finding of the path, and obfuscate
perception.

Mentalenvironism.

I’m told I must care
about the Polar Bear,
since the ice is melting
into the sea.
But I’m wondering if
the Polar Bear
gives as much
as a tuppeny fuck
for me?

feles inter columbas

there’s an ice coming
and it’s coming soon
there’ll be lots of killing
as we fight for room
you’ll find no safe place
no matter where you’ve looked
what land isn’t ice bound
will have been nuked
of course we could plan
as a species to survive
but that ain’t gonna happen
since we prefer to strive
for gee gaws and toys
we can play with today
and we care not a fig
as the clock ticks away
so don’t tell the grandkids
that their generation
is probably the one that is
set for damnation
no point in upsetting them
it may not come to pass
and If you are dead and buried
they can just kiss your ass
right?

Synaptic.

There’s a dreadful aroma
in the Pleroma.
Burning braincells
when humans think.
0ptions of action;
desensitise olfaction,
or obliterate the bastards
because they stink.

Half Light

Half Light

A danger
of taking
life seriously,

is that one
tends to act
quite imperiously.

Which is all very fine
if you’re something divine,

but it makes
humans look
most posteriorously.


Note : posteriorously IS a word.
As anyone who reads the Journal of Hymenoptera research
can tell you. (beep beep)
pic, Are You My Prince. George Draghici

M Theory Heavy Zen (light verse)

Leading physics ‘boffins’ now concur with Abidharma,
That it’s we who are the authors, of our individual dramas.
The Universe, they say is a membrane; of wobbly ‘not matter’.
It’s about a zillionth, of a millimetre thick! Or not much fatter.
We roll and fold it about with our minds, in a process of perceiving.
But all that we come up with, is a means of self deceiving.
Since ‘self’ as such, is not the case; there really is no ‘you’.
As ‘you’, are an agglomeration, of all sorts of stuff, and goo.
It seems that what ‘first’ happens is the membrane; has a blip.
A plasma instability that causes it to rip.
Well ‘ripple’ more than rip is right. Remember this thing wobbles?
And the wibbling in this wobbling is the cause of all our troubles.
This wibbling is reaction, it creates an interface.
In which we fold the stuff about to construct time and space.
We start out as a springy thingy; a non reactive wave.
Then we start to assert ourselves, getting rather brave.
Other waves and impulses, shove and bounce us around.
Then we take up the impulse, to shove back, or stand our ground.
So we start to ‘sense’ and ‘feel’ and in all this wavy shunting,
We carve ourselves a space in time, and think that we are something.
But if we don’t react to impulses; refuse to take them personally!
There’s nothing at all, for us to perceive: Speaking Universally!
The Abidharma authors, knew about all this, way back.
The brilliant old Buddha man, put them on the right track.
He said we, ‘emerge as impulse’, from the cloud of unknowing.
And by grasping at sensations our perceptions begin growing.
Sensations become feelings. And feelings become force!
And what do you do with force? Well you push things round of course.
We make worlds and stars and atoms, forcing little whirls and rolls.
That gain gravity as spheres; a real load of balls.
Like kids with sticks in puddles we go stirring, making waves.
Then the waves roll back and hem us in. We make ourselves wave slaves.
The example of the ‘Chariot’, was how Buddha explained our lot.
Wheels and shafts and a cradle together! And see what you have got?
But take away the parts and you do not have a whole.
Take away all our perceptions; we don’t even have a soul.
So the ‘you’ is just composed of the bits of mind’s perception.
And ‘you’, literally are; the fruits, of your own conception.
But desire drives sensation, and we feel and force and quest.
Nosiness! Possessiveness! Mean ego without rest.
From unknowing into knowing, We leap into infinity
And when we find we’re in a mess, we appeal to some divinity.
Ah! But it’s all down to us. We make the thing with mind.
We look for things, and often are distressed at what we find.
For duality is the demon, because we always insist,
On a double edged capacity, in all that we make exist.
We want ‘better’! That’s the trouble. In fact it’s a real curse.
Because if we make a ‘better’. We have to have a ‘worse’.
And worse is all we’ll ever have. For nothing meets the test,
Of the underlying gnosis; that what we have is never best.
We rush around for greener grass, for deeper love, for brighter gems.
And the angst that we won’t obtain them, is from where all fear stems.
We sacrifice our peace and lives, in a rat race to be free.
But by grabbing and holding on to things; we’re cluttered up! You see?
Chained and bound like Marley’s ghost, with stuff that we acquire.
A detritus we drag around collected by desire.
Encumbered thus we move through fields of energy that swirls.
Billows and bobs in little waves, and great big monstrous curls.
The energy of mind inhabits vehicles in succession,
And we drag collected burdens, through lifetimes long progressions.
Attachments form attachments and our burden won’t be cast,
Until sweet realisation, dawns on us at last.
Of course the temporal notion, is all our own construct.
We cram ‘before’, and ‘after’, in a dualistic duct.
A metempsychotic morphing, of ‘mine’ laying, in the places,
We return to, just to have them, blow right up into our faces.
A singularity of will, that forces a wormhole
Through fractal flakes and wobble wibbles, blibs and blobs and all.
So mind swirls in chaos wormholes, into worses; into betters.
Greed desire, pain and fear, welding attachment’s fetters.
We push and twist and whirl and turn, in being we are bound.
For as long as we just incarnate, to screw our ‘selves’ around.

Forest Dancer.

Forest Dancer, silver stream
bounding on the woodland green.
Bounce and bubble, hiss and sing.
Splash a spray on Heron’s wing.
Over rock; roll, boil and spout
making stairway for the trout.
Through the gorge in raging rush,
giggling in the underbrush.
Running by the grassy glade,
where the Coney path is laid.
‘Neath the Oak grove’s darkened leaf:
Haunt of ancient robber chief.
Muddy beach and shingle shore,
silent waters slowly pour.
Drifting o’er reflected sky,
hovering magic dragonfly.
Silver thorax gleaming bright
twirling wings throw rainbow light.
Alder, Willow, drape the banks;
veils that sway on Dancer’s flanks.
Wagtail paddle, Dipper bird dive;
from the Dancer’s store they thrive.
Combed like horse tails for a show,
submerged Water Crowfoot flow.
Rat and shrew and water vole,
nestled in a streamside hole.
Yellowflag Iris blazing bold,
Purple Loosestrife, Marigold.
Patterns paint on waters edge,
hailing Warbler in the sedge.
Surging life force never sleeps
where the Forest Dancer leaps.


Could have sworn I'd already posted this.
We unfashionable Romantic poets, are only partially in this world, y'know!

Genus Loci.

Some places own you.
A charge of rare energy seizes your soul.
Your mind hears, a familiar distant call.
Synchronistic déjà vu.
You were here before and you never went away.
Being somewhere else, was just a game you’d play.

Some places embrace you.
The prodigal child is hugged and squeezed and kissed.
You are home and it’s OK. But Oh! How you were missed.
Time was a bird and it flew.
Your absence was an aberration of insignificant duration.
A dull beat on a drum of lead, buried deep, beyond all exhumation.

Some places become you.
Their resonance mutates genetic coding at your core.
They walk with you, talk with you, weep with you from every pore.
The one you were is two.
Your dreams and thoughts are forever and always, something that you share.
The life that was all yours is lost, for the life of the place, is also there.

Some places eat with you.
They digest deluges of dialogue and dictionaries of definition.
They gorge with you, on gobbets of gargantuan erudition.
Your senses are their pot of stew.
Ingredients of information stir into imagination.
Casseroled considerations, cook into co-operative… joint… considerations.

Some places open their souls to you.
You know them from when nothing, snapped into dust, and you know their
tortured temporal history.
You know that their condition is a confusion, erroneously labelled, mystery.
Such places think and feel, it is true!
And whatever you think and feel, wherever you are, whatever you do…
Some places own and embrace you. Some places eat with you and become you…
Some places… are you.

Helicobacter Pylori. (A study in blame)

Helicobacter Pylori, you tentacled slithering swine.
You’ve had lots of fun, but now your time’s done,
in this duodenum of mine.
You’ve wriggled and rampaged, and taken advantage
to give my poor innards a roasting.
A terrible way, I will say if I may,
to repay, my most generous hosting.

You first gave me gut rot, when I was a wee tot,
that loved to go in rooting in drains.
For decades I’ve writhed, as you’ve burrowed and strived,
to visit on me, awful pains.
A fortune I’ve spent on, acidic prevention,
unaware, of infection by worms.
Intimate relations, of quite some duration,
and not even on first name terms.

My days have been crippled by ulcers and cramps.
Most debilitating, it’s true.
I'd be in Halls of Fame, with the champs,
if I hadn’t been lumbered with you.
I’d have nutmegged George Best, and pissed past the rest,
and lifted the cup for the Rovers.
But I’ve only been fit, to lie down smoking shit,
burning potholes, in my new pullovers.

You have impaired my love life, or so I am told,
though I haven’t had many complaints.
Oh what a Lothario, I might have been,
if not handicapped by your taints.
You’ve caused punctuations, in bedroom gyrations,
that I will not miss on our parting.
An amplification, of audio gastration,
with excessive belching and farting.

My fondness for boozing was not of my choosing,
the medical team now have found,
that a gut full of ale was a tactic I used,
to dull you, so’s I could sleep sound.
You’ve stayed bloody sloshed, on the loot that I’ve sploshed,
and never once paid for a round.
I’d be stinking rich, but for you, you vile bitch.
You have screwed me for many a pound.

But now it’s all over and I am in clover,
to you the death blow has been dealt.
I’m hoping somehow as you passed through my ass,
that you found out, just how I have felt!
So science has triumphed, and antibiotics
have settled you, to my delight.
With one loud ‘Hooray!’ I have flushed you away.
Begone! Evil dread, parasite.

Past sell by date, food chain store seconds.

The bugs already rule the world.
They can easily defeat us.
For the moment they're content,
to just let us breed and eat us.

Tourist Information.

Once I had a heart
that carried no scars,
when I lived in an ocean
of spinning stars.
Once I had a mind
that I thought
was my own.
But it flew off wherever
the wind was blown.
Once I believed
the Earth was still.
In a wilderness night
on a cloud covered hill,
by the old Roman camp
at the head of the Aire.
Silence and peace,
without worry or care.

The radio chattered
and the TV, flickered.
The Governments groaned
and the Oppositions sniggered.
The salesmen prattled
and the advertisers pitched,
and the women in the sweatshops
stitched … and stitched …and stitched.
Bulldozers buried
old circles of stones.
Mechanical diggers
unearthed old bones.
War planes screamed;
dope smokers dreamed,
while drunkards sang
of sweet Sally Jones.
The Summer sales
were lewd parades
of peroxide tints
and pastel shades.
A rattle of stilettos
and the accents
of the ghettos,
echoed from the concrete
with the ambulance's wail.


Sweet Sally Jones,
her brain burned by sin,
stares at the shit pot
in the loony bin.
What the nurses see
when they peep
through the door,
is that when she shits,
she shits on the floor.
She is staring at the bulls
with purple skulls
that come charging
through the wall.
Every snake is an elf
my dear,
and every elf
is a snake.
You can get a
snake kebab
but you can’t get
an elfin steak.
They vaporise
the elves do!
They slip through
metamorphic veils.
The prize of having
fairie eyes
is that you
can follow their trails.
Do you like to be
beside the Sidhe side?
When the portals
are popping
and the barriers
are dropping
and this wheel
world is buckled
by the force
it sits beside.
“Where are
The portals found?”
she asked.
“How can we
get there again?”
Imagination, meditation,
concentration are…
the portals in your brain.
It becomes so much clearer
when you are dead
that you need me
like a hole in the head.
No jewelled gate
in Samarkand
can take you to
the promised land.
But some old stones
on lofty moors
are doors, my dear.
And that’s for sure.
So bathe thy feet
in milk each day
when it blows
cold and breezy.
And do so
when the Sun
burns bright,
and thine feet
will be cheesy.
Weep for nothing.
For that
is what you’ll get.


A law was passed
forcing Scotsmen in kilts
to gird up their gonads
when walking on stilts.
There’s a flaw
in the law of gravity
that induces
severe depravity.
The wheel world
of Cicero, is really
a rolling reality.
It’s hub is a collection
of perceptions of infinity.
And the paths
of the perceptions
go out
in all directions.
And gods are
nature archetypes
of elemental kind,
empowered and enabled
in the limits
set by mind.
That’s not
how Cicero, said it!
No matter,
for that’s how
I reddit.
For we are
what we dream,
sweet daughter of Venus.
And you dream daily
of the
pan galactic penis.
I could be anybody;
brilliant or thick,
but I’d do for you
with money
and a prick.
Do you dream
of Jesus
as your lover?
Good looking
well muscled
and tall.
With a powerful Papa,
the guy had it all.
Of course as you know,
power can be manic
and usually is
when it manifests organic.
The protection
of power
is the primary preference
where pain
is a permanent feature.
Nerves and emotions
sum an organic creature.
Emotions have
thermodynamic propensity.
Dormant! Then they overheat.
And their hearts
are eaten
by entropy.
Such is the state
of organicised fate.
Think it’s unfair?
Don’t go there.

Here And There!

Transcendence and kenosis
are far from inconceivable.
For what is conceived in chaos,
has to be believable.

... stuffed

Peace on Earth! You must be kidding.
Peace came second in the bidding.
Pipped, before the hammer fell,
By a finger raised from Hell.
Warfare takes the Lot, and the fate
Of Earth is held in his estate.
Plead and pray and cry despair,
The deal is done, the auction fair.
Going once and going twice,
But Peace could never meet the price.
Impoverished, are Peace ideals.
Their fare consists of meagre meals.
Hollow words and shallow acts
Echoing sanctimonious tracts.
Peace campaigning! Do me a favour!
Watery gruel that has no flavour.
Bleated babble; a Sacred Cow.
Lowing ‘Holier than Thou.’
In a field of blind belief,
Justifying blood and grief.
Screw it up, and ‘it’s god’s will’.
As is old tripe, and pig swill.
Hold the line and lock the shields.
Energies dwell, in battlefields.
Cosmic clashes! Warring stars!
Mutant microbes in constant wars!
Nature of Nature? Strength holds sway.
Conflict! … Looks like Nature’s way.

See Through - Cthulhu (Or Reincarnation. An Agony. In Infinite Fits)

This world is a spinning slaughterhouse.
A Carousel of reeling repetition.
A Roller Coaster ride over hills of anxiety
into vales of terrifying uncertainty.
A fixed game of no chance, that in the end
ensures that we lose everything.

The fabric of our flesh fatigues
like metal under strain.
And breaks our hold,
loosens our grip,
as we are finally flung
from the fairground of life.

Murdered by the mangling frenzy of greed
which is, but the nature of the material.

Strings of scattered genetic shards
and remnants of subtle energies which
built our fairground forms,
weave into tentacles of attraction,
drawing us back
into the gurgling glare
of gaudy light.

Smith's Funeral.

I didn’t go to Smith’s funeral.
Smith, and I had an agreement,
that whoever went first would spare the other
the bullshit of bereavement.
The limpid eulogising:
Some po faced Holy Joe;
prattling piss we didn’t believe,
in a gloomy morbid show.

I went to Smith’s tree planting.
A memorial tree in the park;
where Smith, and I would sit all day,
swilling cider till’ after dark.
Smith, would rant about modern life
and history, and tomorrow.
And blame it all on the price of ale:
The cost of drowning sorrow.

Smith, was a blowhard of living.
A Poet, a Bard and a Prince!
He could blast out a curse in perfect verse
that would make the Devil wince.
I want to remember his madness.
His wild visions; so truly divine.
So I didn’t go to Smith’s funeral
And he won’t be coming to mine.

I have included this belatedly in the edited(ish) stuff, having been reminded today of the sudden passing of my old hoppo’ Ian Smith, of Wakefield and Manningham. Smith’s funeral was actually far from as we had imagined when we made the pact, but I’m glad I honoured it. Smith, always said he didn’t want to go to a Heaven where anyone was excluded, however much of a low shitbag they had been in life. Almost the exact words as I recall. And since Mighty Smitey, was a gifted Shaman and Seer; I have no doubt that such a Valhalla, awaits.

The Awen Of Autumn.

What was glistening green
is now amber and gold,
yet as fair on the eye
as when young, though it’s old.
The energy strong
as the colours arrange
and paint on the woodland
the patterns of change.
Dank air fills the nostrils,
the mulch midden groans
with mountains of leaves
that are swept from the lawns;
to mould through the winter,
then boil, broth and brew
into foods for young grass
that will shine with Spring, dew.
Through the Awen of Autumn,
the Prajna; the Chi!
The vibrant life force
is sent wandering free.
As a seeming death dealer;
decaying and ending.
But just Nature, at work,
on Her, tending and mending.


I don't write many poems of an order that can be dedicated to an Aunt. But this one fell into my head, and it isn't too philosophical and heavy. So as promised, I'm dedicating it to my Auntie Kath. Hope you like it Auntie Kath, X.

Many thanks to Mark Sunderland, for permission to use the pic, from his Yorkshire Through The Seasons series.
www.marksunderland.com
"Sunlit autumn leaves reflected in the rippling water of the River Wharfe near Bolton Abbey."

Hadronic Mechanics. A scanner in the works.

Oh say can you see?
Because I can't.
But I haven't bothered to look.
I may be mistaken
and logic forsaken,
misread, misinformed and mistook.
Dimensions are
damning distractions,
of devilish detailed deployment.
Because they're acausal
their very disposal
redeems them in constant enjoyment.

Syntactical Objectification.

My Grimoire,
was never
very far
from finished.
It was
as if
the chequered
flag was
just around
the bend.
No signal
that the
torment was
in any
way diminished.
That held
me in
the certainty
that soon
it all
would end.

It’s the
same node;
same old
story told,
once upon
a rhyme.
For the
node knows
that when
one node
falls the
same node
still arises.
Once again,
is never
told true,
so there
can be
no surprises.
One is
one and
one and
one, and
can be
counted just
one time.

http://www.matrixmasters.net/podcasts/TRANSCRIPTS/TMcK-InValleyNoveltyPt01.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-g7Y8Shxn9Q&feature=PlayList&p=01EBE676308D44E1&index=0

Me transmitte sursum, caledoni

Abandon your integrity,
just a little bit.
The worst thing that can happen then,
is you get away with it.
Integrity is what you are,
Integral to your being.
And every time you barter it,
the real you goes fleeing.
The real you will not maintain,
your soul becomes a washed out shell.
And very soon you’ll know that you,
don’t have to die, to go to Hell.

Particle Particulars.

Particle Zenics.

The ‘big bang’ isn’t big.
It’s very, very small.
And out across infinity
doesn’t register,
at all.

As the mind focuses
the microscope of concentration
it perceives the clutter
of colliding, conflicting concepts
that constitute the cloud
of clammy confusion,
in what is
clownishly called creation.

The pattern
is a random scrawl
drawn in a damned,
dancing deluge of delusion,
and whoever
or whatever
put it into being
screwed up
‘small’ time.

The reality of ‘reality’
is
that it is
a waste of space.

A paradoxical point
that is pointless.

David Hazell

Druid Dharma

Through section of Large Hadron Collider.


Out of the cloud of unknowing. Out of the veiled beyond.
The merest impulse probing through, makes ripples on the pond.
The senses and the urges, random graspers of the form,
enjoin with dim perception, to fantasise a norm.
The storm tossed mind that bounces on the ocean of mind states
is prey to every impulse in the raging sea of fates.
To all events and wing beats, we are energy chained slaves.
And only non attachment, makes us Master of the waves.


The radius of the AUBREY CIRCLE is related directly to the SPEED of LIGHT; and the radius of the SARSEN CIRCLE corresponds to the square of the reciprocal of the speed of light.

May Fields.

In the flowering fields of May
I will walk upon the hills,
and breathe again the early summer air.
And in gratitude I’ll taste
the fragrance of the land,
and enjoy the simple fact that I am there.
For Springs and Summers fly
with the passing of the years.
A month seems like a day; a year, a week.
So with some smug satisfaction,
I will rest in laurel groves,
in contentment, that there’s nothing, I would seek.
The experiences of life
hold great mystery; and the spice,
of curiosities, inflame desire.
But the anti climax law
worms through every seed we sow,
and the borne fruit, seldom is, what we require.
So in the bright Maytime
I will look on England’s glory,
as she carefully puts on Her Summer dress.
As I watch the months and years
fly away with all my fears.
I will ponder on the things that I may bless.

A Demon Seed.

The human condition? A state of attrition!
No wonder they all get depressed.
What with organs that fail, and bodies that ail?
It can’t leave them all that impressed
With whatever has caused, them to be so disposed
In a flimsy, pain sensitive sack.
An abomination. A joke of creation?
Where dreams surpass gifts that they lack.
The frustration of hope. The slippery slope
They slide down, as their world comes apart.
Hardly a wonder they stumble and blunder
In efforts they dare to call art.

The Screening Process

So that they don’t disturb our dreams
we close our ears to distant screams.
So that they do not haunt our nights
we turn our thoughts from awful sights.
We throw up screens and nets and walls
and we dwell in a maze of occlusion.
This is the world of illusion.
This is the world of illusion.

The Old Firm.

The doors of perception...
Oh! What a conception
to be the great know all
of all that is seen.
Ah! What a delight
to have total insight,
of what will be; what is,
and indeed; what has been.
But a gift of such power
can taste rather sour
and give you some cause
for regret.
When the doors are thrown wide
you can look right inside,
and what you SEE is...
What you get.
Innit?

On The Pennine Way In Spring.

Tiny buds of purple, peek from in the ochre heather.
And nesting pheasants fuss, as I stroll by.
The ‘God light’ pokes strong fingers through the warring western clouds.
As the Sun, combs amber furrows, through the bruised and bleeding sky.
In the vales, the apple blossoms, speckle snowy patterns.
With promises of Nature’s bounteous yields.
The Lambs are growing stronger, and they stray now from the Yews.
And Daffodil, etch golden lines, where hedges cut the fields.
Patches of green can now be seen, on copse and ancient woodland.
Vestiges of life; where mighty forests, once did swell.
So different, the economy, of ‘civil service’ Pines.
That march like sombre soldiers, on the softly rounded fell.
Sunlight swings an arc of hope, along a winding river,
Lighting silver ribbon; and froth, of waterfalls.
Then it dances in the dell before it polishes the Ivy,
That clings with faith unbending, to old Monastery walls.
High upon a moorland seat, I watch the shifting shadows.
Unenvious of those today, who dwell in desert lands.
Although in truth I’m blessed; for I too have seen the magic,
Of the swirling Djinns, and Moonlit mounds, of endless tawny sands.

The French.

I love the French. Their food is great,
The women have ample asses.
They chopped off all their noble’s heads
To level out the classes.
They curl their lips and cock their hips
Their wine is just divine.
But best of all they gave the world
Positione’ sixty nine.

A Cupid Stunt

The Love God is a feckless thing
It’s arrows it doth’ wildly fling
But each hath curs'ed poison sting
For though the heart when struck may sing
And dreamily to hope may cling
Eftsoons that hope will swiftly wing
And lovelorn care the hands shall wring
T’were better that th’ Amor’ King
Would snap the bow and break the string.

Feasting Folk

Let’s all wet the baby’s head
Uncle Wilf’ and Auntie Sue’
Will be the godparents they said
And Sue’ will make a trifle too.
We’ll get some wine, Australian,
And Cola for the kids.
OJ for Alan and Damien!
Cola blows their lids.

Janine is throwing a tantrum
Because she didn’t get a bike.
And who bought Jim that bloody drum?
Someone that we don’t like!
At least the Turkeys nicely done
You ballsed that up last year.
This Christmas must be a merry one,
I’ve got in gallons of beer.

See Ingrid there, with the curly hair?
Looks like nothing would interest her.
Well that Prof’ who held the Lit’ chair
Fucked her in the first semester.
Some graduation; this is a joke,
Champagne and sausages on sticks!
Let’s piss off and score some coke,
Forget about these gowned clown hicks.

Well many thanks to my old mate Stan’.
In an act of desperation,
He went and picked me to be best man
And give you this oration.
A proper sit down do, as well
Much classier than a buffet’.
The prawn cocktails have a familiar smell
But I suppose we can’t be fussy.

Oh stop it Jean. You’re rid of the louse
You’re free to look around.
You get to keep the kids and house
It couldn’t be more sound.
Stop snivelling for pity’s sake
You’ll soon have a man with tits like those
Here have a piece of chocolate cake
And for God’s sake blow your nose.

Yes give me sunshine any day
Though we have been skiing twice.
Not my idea of a holiday,
Cold and snow and bastard ice.
What’s in this drink the waiter brought
Apart from all the fruit?
Let’s nip down to that nudist beach,
Swap the thong for your birthday suit.

Here have another vol au vent
The dog puke in em’ makes me squirm.
I wouldn’t say they’ve overspent,
How long was Perkins with the firm?
The MD wasn’t too verbose.
Taciturn and to the point.
When I retire I’ll just piss off
And tell them where to stuff this joint.

Go on I’ll have a double gin
Helen’s staying sober so she can drive.
The ham on these sandwiches is a bit thin.
Tim would tell them if he were alive.
I’m glad cremation was their choice
Those graveside jobs can be a pain,
Got a sore throat once and lost my voice,
Standing on mud in the fucking rain.

The Legerdemain Of Legend

The source of a legend is vital,
In determining if it is fact.
The Irishman’s art, is inclined to impart
Some embellishment where it is lacked.
Ogham, survived in the Emerald isle,
Where the Druids, were always book cooking.
What ere’ it may seem, it may be not so green
As much as it is, grassy looking.
Once, beyond the Pale, you will get a tale
For just any question you ask.
Making it fit, by talking auld’ shit,
Will prove to a rustic, no task.
So Bean Sidhe, and Boggart, will people the land,
For those that have ears to listen.
Keep buying the stout, and without a doubt
You’ll see ancient eyes start to glisten.
The fairies of glens, the dark wraiths of fens,
And cartloads of Leprechaun lore,
Will be yours if you are, back and forth to the bar.
Keep em’ coming, and you will get more!
You’ll hear how Druids, of evil design
Put terrible curses on cattle and swine.
The plots they were hatching with Divilish sctratching,
A smouldering demon in evr’y scrawled line.
A small price to pay, as you go on your way
With a head full of Blarney blessed mystery.
And who is to say they are lies, anyway?
Spinning yarns, can’t be messed up with history!

Atecotti. The Oldest Ones.

‘The Oldest Ones’, were spoken of in hushed and whispered tones.
‘The guardians of the Henges.’ ‘The readers of the stones.’
The ones who wore hair feathers, and slept in tents of hide.
The ones who seemed to disappear, like froth borne by the tide.
So mystery breeds legend, and saga finds a home.
For ‘Antlantean’ Atecotti, who threw back mighty Rome.
And story springs from story with the passing on of blood.
Fuelling tales of ‘Hern the Hunter’, and ‘Robin of the Hood’.
Though they were men of flesh, they lived as in a dream.
With a spirit in each stone and tree, a God in every stream.
In harmony with fox and bird, and earth and star and bough.
The Atecotti, reaped and let, sweet Nature push the plough.
An herbal lore, and secret ways, that Druid masters knew.
The knowledge of ‘The Oldest Ones’, passed on to chosen few.
Not dead, but living still they are, where wilderness is cherished.
Where men commune with Nature, Atecotti, have not perished.
In every sheltered ‘fairy dell’, on each stone circled plain.
An Atecotti, spirit dwells, and waits; to come again.

A version of this commissioned poem, was first published in ‘The Forest of Bowland (At The centre Of the Kingdom). 2004. I rushed it a bit so I’ve altered it. A publisher told me that you can change a poem until it’s published, but not afterwards. A Shaman, told me that changing a poem can change the whole shape of time and space. OK. If you perceive the whole shape of time and space changing, and choose to blame me… feel free to do so!

The Bright And Shining Way.

On a Pennine, moor, there runs an ancient Roman road.
Now stark; and lonely is the path where armoured legions strode.
The paving stones lie still exposed, though weather worn and
broken.
And there on nature's table sign, a passing empire's token.
The Sun with hesitation, starts to wrestle with the cloud,
And seems to clothe the moor in a waving misty shroud.
The dew damp stones gleam silver at the breaking of the day,
Like a ribboned band of diamonds; a bright and shining way.
The wispy wraiths of morning mist, slide and curl and twist,
And mockingly shape human forms in every hanging drift.
As if the moor weaves memory, in soft diaphanous braid.
And whimsically; paints on dawn, a ghostly cavalcade.
Reborn in brief and shifting smoke, the image never still,
Across the bounds of time they walk, who trod the heathered
hill.
A rounded helm, A gleaming eye, filled with righteous zeal.
A kilted, claymore bearing rogue in search of beef to steal.
A ragged, panting rushing band, armed with hoes and staves.
And weary, dragging fresh cut stones, despairing Roman slaves.
Roving Norsemen stand aghast, in awe at such construction.
See grim faced Oswald marching north, determined on
destruction.
Here, high on the true highway; there's no easy ambush made.
So carefree pass the travellers shades that cowered in the
glade.
And walking first, before them all on shoes of plaited straw,
A man and woman dressed in skins; gaze, on the vales below.
There, carved out before them by the fast retreating ice.
A fresh and empty fertile land, an Eden paradise.
Then Helios bold in battle, forces his burning sway.
His heat burns off the mists and the phantoms flee away.
Reflected photons leave the moor and leap in constant flight.
And all that passes in the day is held in speeding light.
From star to star, across the void, refracted across space.
In time and light, the record holds the road of human race.
Light years away, a focussed eye turned earthward could behold,
The tramping Roman legions; and all the men of old.
The moor road, and every other road that leads to Rome,
Score the scars of man's design, on the face of his home.
And the pattern of his making, shines in every ray,
Of heaven filling light. A bright; and shining way.

Prayer

Would you want anyone, to kneel and pray to you?
What a snotty rotten thing to want someone to do!
What an egomanic, what a lousy Sod.
Frankly we are screwed, if a thing like that IS God.
But it seems that we are drifting
Into a Godless age.
I won’t pray, for Marxist reasons.
I’ll paraphrase the Sage
“Anything that wanted ME to pray to it, wouldn’t
be worth praying to.”

Pendle Solstice.

I braved the Barley steps in the half light this solstice morn. No brilliant sunise to behold this year, but some breaks in the cloud afforded views from the heights that seemed to be a floating gallery of surreal bubbles. Each one holding small private world of sunlit fields. Just a few bold wanderers on the hill, and some drumming chanters whom I avoided, preferring the quiet stillness of the dawn. Anyway, I'm posting the Pendle poem I wrote after I stayed on the hill overnight, and caught a clear and brilliant sunrise, on the Summer solstice of 06. Back to work now, on my new 'Mystic', epic.




On The Witching Hill At Midsummer.


The path was steep but stepped for ease, as we mounted
the flank of ‘The Whale’.
Our mission was to test the truth, of another old Pendle
tale.
For Pendle hill is a mound of myths, and fantasies and
dreams,
Where witches ride, and ghosts abide, and a wind whipped
Bean Sidhe screams.
With noble and forbidding brow, and broad of back and
shoulder,
The ancient altar hill was shaped by mighty ‘frost
giant’ moulder.
Looming up from England’s heart, as if it heaves with
pride
The ‘Old Man’ glowers sternly oe’r the pastured
riverside.
We pegged our sheet on the plateau, with the sky still
full of light
And waited on the magic hill to greet the Gods of night.

A massive Moon swept the southern sky, like honey in a
jar.
A groaning glow that challenged, the light of the
evening star.
The Sun slid into the western sea, throwing up colours
and shade:
Amber, gold and cobalt blue; coral and beige and jade.
Then as the arc celestial dimmed, to navy blue, from grey
The marchers of the heavens came to boldly stride their
way.
Mirfak elbows clear a path for Perseus to steer.
She goat, Capella’s glistening bleat heralds the
Charioteer.
A bright eye gleams on Lyra’s harp; Vega, the eagle of
stone.
Cassiopeia, still vain in her chain, spins on her
captive throne.

I sat musing on the summit mound, and watched the
starlight bloom,
And remembered that the hill, held many an ancient
tomb.
I thought of how those stone age people, buried at
this site
Must have seen those self-same stars, on long gone,
Midsummer nights.
There were two of us at the vigil; yet I’d read how
in days gone by,
A healthy host of hundreds had gazed at the morning
sky.
Dear old Jessica Lofthouse; had written the tale of tradition.
And she’d told the tale of the dubious sight that
had brought us on the mission.
From Pendle’s height at Midsummer sunrise,
she’d claimed one would behold,
York Minster windows, reflecting the Sun, shining
a reddish gold.


It’s seventy miles from Pendle to York, so like many we
had pondered,
And wondered if old Jessica’s mind, just like her feet
had wandered.
But come the dawn, if skies were clear, we’d put it to
the test.
And we fixed a compass point to York, at the highest
point of the crest.
A steady chill had gripped the air, there were wisps of
cloud and rain.
So we brewed some tea, and I took a stroll around the
upper terrain.
I could see the glow of great cities, and towns, making
orange, the sky;
Manchester, Liverpool, Burnley and Blackburn, easy to
pick with the eye.
But to the north, just the darkened shape of the
dreaming Bowland fells.
And north and east in the purple night, the limestone
moorland swells.

Suddenly, I realised I’d lost the track I’d followed.
I’d strayed in from the plateau’s edge to where the
ground had hollowed.
A cloud had settled on the hill, and the mist was
getting thicker.
I shone my torch on the ground around, and the light
from it started to flicker.
I knew that a great many lives, had ended on this place.
The records show the details, of many a tragic case.
Some had wandered over the edges and hurtled to their
deaths.
Others, in the bogs and soughs, had gasped their final
breaths.
And tales abound of some who were found; their faces
frozen in fear.
In the mind's eye, on a misty moor; who knows what might
appear?

It was said that here the witches met, great evils to
set free.
More likely just a bunch of bawds, having a midnight
spree.
But their frolics cost them dearly; hanged and vilified.
Perhaps their only evil, was they’d fancifully lied?
But myths hold hard in folk mind, and few gaze on this
hill,
Without a thought of cackling crones, and maybe feel a
chill.
Myths beget myths, and terror tales on mystic canvass
bloom,
Like Duergar, an evil dwarf tricking wanderers to doom.
Greenies; the fairies from under the hill, setting traps
and snares,
And Spriggan elves who rob and thieve and make off with
your wares.

I chuckled at the thought of how, such legends could
begin.
How brigandage had been explained by supernatural spin.
How many had escaped the law, who’d simply helped
themselves,
Then turned up in a fearsome state, and claimed to be
robbed by elves?
But I’d need to move most warily; to save my light and
test my tread,
By prodding with my oaken stick, to traverse Pendle’s
misty head.
Or stand there in the chilling gloom and wait for the
mist to lift?
But a settled mist could hold for days, so I’d have to
make a shift.
I moved, avoiding bogs and boulders, gully, ditch and
bush.
Determined to come to a path, without a panicked rush.

Something moved behind me. Scuffling across the ground.
I glimpsed a shuffling huge dark shape; heard the low
growl of a hound.
The Striker, sometimes called the Trash, was said to
roam this bog.
A demon eyed, razor toothed; huge ferocious dog.
Another silly tale I thought, Though my neck hair had
grown stiff.
No man of my age should be feared by silly country myth.
But my mind had been gripped by Barbus, the demon of all
fears,
And each ditch gurgle, and whisper of brush was fodder
for my ears.
I thought of hybrid wolves maybe? Survivors from the
past,
The last wolf slain was not from here. If it was
the last?

But I firmly gripped my oaken stick, and pushed on
through the mist.
I’d deal with any flesh made thing with stick and boot
and fist.
And if some demon thing of darkness, came at me from
hell,
I’d say ‘Regards to your master. I feel I know him well.’
I’ve seen his work in human kind, who back stab, cheat
and lie.
While they smile and wheedle to your face, and look you
in the eye.
And I know there’s nothing in the hells, so brutal and
so vile
As the demons of humanity who slaughter with a smile.
Whatever slid along the ground, old badger, fox or thing
in hiding,
Probably had a purer heart, than one in which
falsehood’s abiding.

The thickening fog started to swirl, serpents and
dragons peopled the mist,
Faces of some I knew were dead, some I had fought with;
some I had kissed.
I marvelled at my own mind’s eye and how it could
conjure any such sight?
The imagination’s a well fed thing on a haunted hill in
the dead of night.
A gentle breeze wiped my brow, and the fog flew from the
moor.
I beheld the milky way again and the glare from the
valley floor.
My nightmare done, I found the track and went to the
summit again.
Where my companion grunted, and uttered a curse, about
‘fog and bloody rain.’
I settled and took an offer, of a welcome brew of tea,
And gazed up from our island hill on the heavenly
starlit sea.

I was drowsy, but old Morpheus, had no embrace for me.
So after a while I shifted again, to look for sights to
see.
From the edge of the hill I saw torches, making their
way through the dale
And I reckoned we’d have several more on the hill,
before the sky would pale.
We made a fresh brew with water fetched, from the
Holy Well at the nose.
Holy to Druids; then Christians. And maybe to what
follows those?
Then as the skies lightened more people arrived, and we
numbered around a score.
There were nods and hellos, but our numbers were small
compared to days of yore.
But spirits and expectations were high, as the
lightening sky shone blue,
And the vales were filled with a soft golden glow, of
gentle octarine hue.

A man started setting a compass point, and clearly the
east was his goal.
We spoke with him, and he too looked to York, to test if
the story was tall.
With hours to go before Helios hail, the midsummer
daylight was full,
And we felt rather foolish that we’d stayed up all night
and made our senses dull.
But the mists in the valleys now hung grey, on the
courses that carried the streams.
Ribble and Hodder and Calder. Were veiled in smoky
dreams.
The green on the fields had a lustre so bright, they
seemed like emerald hoards.
And a soft brown shade alighted the fells, that they
wore like the ermine of Lords.
The eastern horizon was edged for an hour with a sliver
of orange gold.
And the promise was strong that before very long, a
wondrous sight would unfold.


Watches were glanced at, cameras were set, as the
sunrise time came close.
And we looked down on a world where sleepers, slumbered
in repose.
Lost in dreams and anxious fears for manna, love and
hope.
Unaware of our excitement, who had braved the Pendle
slope.
And although I’d paid no fee, save the energy of the
climb.
I felt a sense of privilege to view this dawn sublime.
A murmur rumbled across the hill and north east fixed,
were eyes.
With strange anticipation, as if for some surprise.
And a streak of lightening silver flashed across the
horizon lip.
As the might orb, of morning glory, showed it’s leading
tip.

A blast of orange struck the world and filled the
morning haze.
The hills glowed purple, lilac, pink in whirling heaven
rays.
Bright sparks did firefly dances, on stone barns and dew
damp walls,
And boiling light, poured through valley clefts, like
rolling waterfalls.
Fields of yellow flowers blazed gold, blinding to the
sight.
Wild verdant vibrations, filled green fields with
shimmering light.
The ponds and lakes and reservoirs were sights of awful
dread,
For each was now a pool or patch of brightest crimson
red.
As if some slaughterer in heaven, had wielded a butcher
knife.
And spattered there upon the land, some great God’s blood
of life.

Like poison sulphur spewing vents the river mists boiled
yellow.
Then changed before our eyes to a pinkish hue, more
mellow.
And from yellow to pink; red then amber, like a
galloping horse,
The changing colours raced along, down each river’s
course.
A voice called out, “Look! Look! It’s true.” And an arm
was pointed east.
And we turned and saw a splendid thing for any eyes to
feast.
Across the vales and dales from York, as promised and
foretold,
No pinprick light, but blistering blast, flared mightily
and bold.
Blazing like a second Sun from the lofty sacred bower,
Reflected light, glared burning bright, from the
Minster’s lantern tower.

Oh Jessica my darling girl, if I could hug you now,
I’d squeeze you tired shoulders, and kiss your wrinkled
brow.
I bless your shade, in a paradise glade, may they hail
you as a Queen.
For here on earth by your guidance, I have truly heaven
seen.
Eyes were wide and throats were dry as if we were
dumbstruck.
Each feeling that, to just behold, this thing, was
certain luck.
And I felt somehow that if I never, ever, saw another
thing.
I’d care not, for I had just looked on the jewel store
of a King.
The Himalaya, Alps, and the high Andes may be fine.
But I’ll take England’s quilted pastureland, for taste
of the divine.

The rising Sun had rolled to a height, showering it’s
food of life.
On a world of anxiety, grasping and worry, turmoil, hate
and strife.
The river mists were grey again, melting to a haze.
And the magic hours had passed. We were back in the
measure of days.
Now blue and slate grey green, shone the lakes that had
been red.
And we left the hill in the care of the sheep, and the
ancient resting dead.
As we descended, I wondered if, I might climb that track
again,
If spared from the stuff of the flesh curse; ageing,
sickness, death and pain?
I glanced in the mirror as we drove away, at the peak
tip I'd bestrode.
And I swear the ‘Old Man’ nodded at me! Or was it a bump
in the road?


David Hazell © 2006