Below are a few of my favourites… Click on the links above for the full anthologies - and on the links at the very bottom of the page (if you are on mobile devices - in the side panel if you are not) to buy copies of my anthologies from Lulu.com
Love the skin you’re in
Some women have huge hips and small tits
and are shaped just like a pear
Others have large tits and tiny hips
That isn’t very rare
The secret is to be to happy
In your individuality
You are different, unique
Like a priceless antique
The way you are supposed to be
Some men have huge penis’s
and are really very well hung
others are like a rosebud and have hardly just begun
Some are short and thin and others long and fat
With bits that dangle more or less
And that is simply that
It is indeed the way it is
A reflection of our genes
Be they hers or be they his or somewhere in-between
It matters more where your skin has been
Where you take it for a spin
Ignore what others might think of you
Just bare it all and grin
You’re wonderful just the way you are
So love the skin you’re in
There should be no more not less of you
You’re a perfect specimen
Banshee
The wind can not be seen
But it’s deafening today
Screaming where caught by twisted iron sheet
Ripping through the trees
Stripping the leaves
A wild combing, thinning out and baring,
Howling up the valley like an express train
Screeching on corners
Wailing like an angry lost thing, a Banshee
Bemoaning the end
The soon to be dead
The craw of a crow snatched
Like the moment an umbrella blows inside out
Flapping wildly in the squall
Scraps of birds in funeral black
And the flame red leaves shower down to scatter And lift again in swirls
Like the dresses of wildly dancing girls
Halloween and Samhain
That time of year again
To remember the dead
But no quiet of graveyard this
No whispering words
The power in this invisible air
Neither can the dead be seen or heard
But they are surely there
String Theory
How long is a piece of string?
Does it inevitably begin and end?
When young I would attach two tin cans
And pretend to phone a friend
Were he still alive
I might telephone my dad and ask
And with him, Hear the wind whistle and ping
In the rigging of yachts in safe harbour
And sing a song of Lord Franklin
Threading through the pack ice
Looking for a fabled route
Rime in the rigging
Thick stiff rope held fast in blocks
The aptly named Erebus held tight
In the icy grip of Arctic night
The line on the chart
Through Arctic white
Through bitter biting wind
Done them in, he and his men
An Industrial blight - fashioned in lead
Lines of solder in manufactured tin can rations
And all of them dead
Now the blight spreads
Ice melts
Franklin’s plight is revealed
Passages open
In flood the oil explorers
Opportunities for more exploitation
Fuelling this contracting world of jet flight
A globe wrapped in traces
As planes connect places
And vapour trails criss cross the stratosphere
In this age of ubiquitous travel
Here to here
How we need Ariadne’s thread
To lead us out of this maze
In an infinite world, with monkeys true to type
String might have no beginning, no end
In our finite world everything is connected
Tied
Tightly knit
Webbed
Consequences we didn’t intend
Pull one thread, everything unravels
End to end
By Heart
I know you by heart
by rite, by rote
Learning the lines
the queues, the marks
a Hail Mary, a litany, a chant
sometimes affirmation, sometimes a rant
always rehearsed, well practised and versed
a cut and a thrust
as we spar with our words
for better, for worse
Like rhyming couplets
In tightly knitted verse
you and I
I know you
like the back of my hand
like a well worn path
like a well thumbed book
every gesture, every look
the plot unfurls to plan
ever so since Eve and Adam
ever so of woman and man
every pig headed mr and stubborn madam
re working long established patterns
but for all the repartee
I wouldn’t want it any other way
you are familiar as a favourite spoon, a much loved mug
well worn steps
the patina of years
tended with care
What would I be without you?
A lost glove
An odd sock
The two of us
It just wouldn’t feel right if you weren’t right there
The two of us
A right pair
Monumental
I don’t need my name carved in stone,
cast in brass or bronze,
I am happy without a blue plaque or tablet,
would rather not be a statue,
equestrian or otherwise,
nor a waxwork, or a marble in the park.
I am happy as I am,
no need for martyrdom,
for sainthood or sacrifice.
Leave the stake, I have no need to immolate,
no flowers at a roadside shrine.
Leave me without an epitaph,
no need for bowing heads,
for wreaths or special days,
war memorials or parades.
I would rather live a full life, full of life,
a quiet life, a peaceful life,
and leave the heroics to heroes and saints,
I am happy as I am,
an ordinary man.
Breasts
I love breasts
I just do
I’m sorry if it’s not PC
And I’m sure it’s not unique to me
It may be due
to my masculine gender
And I’m sorry if it’s totally off of the agenda
I just love tits
They’re my favourite bits
So won’t you let it be
While I still have the eyes to see
To enjoy the sight of a goodly pair
Be they clothed or be they bare
As long as I don’t obviously stare
Don’t look askance
At a sideways glance
Let me appreciate
The attributes that adorn
The feminine graces
Won’t you allow
That I should enjoy
Those better endowed
Than I
I just love boobs
Large or small
Encased in lace
In a negligee or brassier
I don’t mind at all
Magnificent balloons
With cleavage to get lost in
A full Mae West
Or perfect and pert
Like a China Jane Austin
pointy as barnacles
Or like cherries or apples or peaches or pears or melons (but not bananas)
Forbidden fruit...
A breast to mother me
A bosom to smother me
Is it an anomaly
That this bit of physiognomy
Should draw my attention
Like no other extension
I know it may’nt ingratiate me
I can’t help that they titillate me
Like they say
Breast is best
And I just love tits to bits
Caution!
Caution!
This poem may be harmful to health
This poem may contain nuts
This poem may be offensive
and be slippery when wet
Appropriate PSE should be worn
Please handle with care
Unauthorised broadcast is forbidden
And may breach copyright law
We shall not hesitate to sue
This way up
No hooks
Do not cover
All rights reserved
This poem must not be operated under the influence of alcohol
or drugs that might impair performance
This poem is private property
Trespassers will be prosecuted
Beware of the dog
And keep out of the reach of children
This poem is not suitable for those of a delicate constitution
Warning! this poem might be dangerous
The poet disclaims all responsibility
use this poem at your own risk
Row Steadily Good Man
Row steadily good man,
a rhythmic stroke as with the breath,
the rise and fall a gentle swell,
a dead calm windless day,
as you row gently away.
The tide ebbs and flows in tune,
with a waxing and waning all too soon,
full then dark and on this day
the sun eclipsed full by the moon.
Row steadfastly your onward journey,
And know that you are held in heart,
The same heavens that you know so well,
from long clear nights of long ago,
will guide you on your way this day,
and the plaintive gull will echo back,
across the salt sea haze.
The horizon line you lie beyond,
out of sight, not out of mind,
beyond that line and in the light,
row steadily, good man, and know,
your course is set and true and right.
And as we stand upon the shore,
and sweep a gaze along that line,
we'll know you're there forevermore
with sea and stars and sun and sand.
And if we listen we will hear
the distant dipping of an oar
and we will stand upon this shore
and wave a cheery hand.
As night draws in
(a poem for Samhain)
November evenings draw dark as coal as was once shaken from the hod as woollen blankets are drawn close wrapped against the draughts that once snook through every gap and under oak plank doors, and dawn brings blankets of damp white mists, pooled in the valleys thick as fleece and the sheep turn their backs to the drizzle to chew sparse grass in grim rumination while hoofs sink deep in autumnal mud and crows caw forlorn and gusts of breeze send showers of leaves falling to join those already piled in every corner, the trees bearing dark branches, adopting their silhouette form for winter withdrawn into the comfort of their roots firm in the bare earth.
And we look too to our roots, our forbears, this Samhain, we gather our dead in remembrance and wear red. Summer’s maiden, child of light, turns to autumn’s Cailleach, twisty witchy bitch hooded dark as pitch, hook’ed and crooked, twisted and turning as all things turn, the lush summer’s green to red brown and black winter’s crone.
In this liminal time when the veil is thin, as sheets of fog cloak the vale, and we gather close our next of kin, lighting fires bright to ward off the night and warm us, door to door we collect the fuel, tricking our way place by place, turnip lanterns and mangle wurzels on the step, candle light guttering through grotesque rough cut features and bone is close covered by translucent pale skin, and we welcome our ancestors in, long dead, with us this Samhain.
The wheel turns, as is the inevitability of time, a never ending flow, and we but leaves carried for a short while on this stream, never back, always on, now only to dream of summer meadow sweet, now to sleep deep in winter as night draws in this Samhain.