4 I Don't Remember (Peter Gabriel)

I didn't know then that I was the Siegfried 
Sasson of Ardoyne. I didn't want 
a slap on the back or another x marked in my school 

jotter that replaced the teacher's star.

For over ten years I have been recovering

form a stroke that paralyzed my right side

left me confined to a wheelchair and all

my long-term memory was erased. Only

now has my mind been strong enough

to tackle these words, I wrote before

I took the massive stroke that almost killed 

me, these words are the memory that was 

erased. It’s as if I knew I would be here at this 

moment, putting memory back into my mind.

Black snow

1.

He hailed stones at a British army post.
His vision seemed more aware that he
Was lifting a half red brick-like an insight,
He gripped it at arm's length ready to run
With the stone thinking, this war apart of
Me and I a part of it?

The brick left his hand and for some un-
known reason he wanted to take It back,
then he saw why as the black soldier popped
up behind the sandbags about to fire a rubber
bullet from the short fat gun.

Everything slowed in motion, the half brick
Hurtled through air and made contact with
His face, skin split, bone cracked and blood
Flowed, he closed his eyes his stomach
Churned in shameful disgust, a friend patted
his back congratulating a fine shot.

He ran away from the crowd along an entry
Where a woman stood screaming the bastards
have shot my only son. He ran to the woman
and saw the body behind her
Held the wall and threw up.

The young mans stomach was ripped open
His intestines oozed out like maggots on concrete.

His mother was in prison for protesting
his sister was in juvenile jail his father
was lost out there in a gunbattle. He lay
on his seperated bunk bed and cried
himself to sleep.

FRAGMENT 1961

For over ten years I have been recovering

form a stroke that paralyzed my right side

left me confined to a wheelchair and all

my long-term memory was erased. Only

now has my mind been strong enough

to tackle these words, I wrote before

I took the massive stroke that almost killed 

me, these words are the memory that was 

erased. It’s as if I knew I would be here at this 

moment, putting memory back into my mind.

"yet why not say what happened”

                                          

Robert Lowell

Peter trudged emotionally along like a 

grieving teenager in two minds. A sports

Bag containing a few well-worn remnants

Of clothing hung over his shoulder. 

 He wished his father had the balls to come 

running through the streets and they would 

stand in public holding each-other and cry. 

As he left the streets realizing his dream was 

not to be, a solitary tear fell down his face, he 

wiped it away like a bead of sweat

 on a summers day. He stood at the bus stop, a 

rage tore through him for his father. I can’t 

hate him he said to himself, trying to convince 

himself.  Like a sinner with no admission for 

what he is, he stood away from the shelter 

with rain falling on like a penance.

He sat on the bus to Belfast wet and lonely his 

knees tucked up onto the seat in front, he 

watched as the people and places roll by like 

the film of his past rewinding in his head. His 

recorded mind clicked and the reason he was 

on the bus.

The atmosphere when peter and his father 

were in the same room was charged with an

 energy like a timing device, nobody spoke. 

Every member of the family felt the tension 

and strain.

You could almost the ticking down, the alarm 

could go off at any moment, the atmosphere 

you could cut with a knife.

When the alarm of confusion could go of it 

blew like a thousand-pound bomb, filled

With hatred. Father and son scrambled with 

rage in their hearts like two strangers

Fighting in a bar over a woman, feet and fists 

making contact with a real vengeance.

For sixteen years he lived under his fathers

reign of hatred, he relished the moment

when he beat him to the ground

this was that moment!

He climbed from the bus and walked through 

the busy streets of Belfast’s city center. 

Reaching the train station, he sat

In a café with a cup of tea, he took the parcel 

of sandwiches, his mother made up

From the sports bag. Inside was an envelope 

with banknotes to the sum of thirty pound

and a note that read: look after yourself, I love 

you mum.

Although very lost and lonely, he felt a 

comfort come over him as if he had known all 

along that he would be in this

Predicament at this time. Lost in his own 

thoughts he thought, isn’t it weird how you 

think and plan and dream then the 

subconscious tells you to do something

That is totally irrelevant to your hopes and 

dreams and the next thing you know its 

occurring without you even knowing.

He climbed from another train of another 

short journey and joined the ferry-boat

To Scotland. Filled with nerves he stood at the 

bar asking for a glass of beer, being only 

sixteen he thought the bartender would tell 

him he was too young hesitating to pay the 

man as he handed him a glass of lager 

surprised with no question. He sat at a table 

among adults drinking alcohol and kids 

drinking cola.

Sipping the cool beer, he felt like a man

Out in the big world bigger than he had ever 

felt before as he watched the vast sea roll by.

The boat docked in Scotland and he waited 

for the night train to London.

The station was filled with squaddies

In combats, he avoided them and didn’t

Speak remembering his childhood in 

Belfast rioting against them.

The train arrived, he placed his bag on the 

rack above in an empty compartment and 

settled into a music mag he bought for the 

journey. 

Through the window was complete darkness 

of the night, you can’t beat a bit of scenery he 

said to himself sarcastically.

The compartment door slid open and in

Walked two squaddies dressed in bush 

camouflage each carrying a back which they 

put up on the rack. Peter's heart was racing as 

he lowered his head pretending to read. 

One stood with his back to peter

Rummaging in his backpack, the other one 

sat beside peter saying, a wright mate

Fine said peter trying to hide his Belfast 

accent returned to his NME. The other 

soldier sat facing him held a six-pack of beer. 

There’s no bar open at night he said

And pulled a can from its plastic holder and

 handed it to peter who hesitated at first then 

took the beer saying thank you!

Are you going all the way to London he 

asked, yeah stammered peter, where you 

coming from asked the other soldier? Peter 

was hesitant to answer then said to himself I 

have nothing to hide and said, Northern 

Ireland. 

Belfast inquired the other soldier recognizing 

his accent, yes and no said peter we lived in 

Belfast for a time until the troubles got bad 

and moved, your parents had a bit of sense

said the other soldier reaching his hand across 

to shake I’m Simon then the other soldier 

reached his hand across I’m will said, peter 

reached out his hand.

It felt strange uncanny, a feeling he felt before 

on the hand of his aunt Sarah who was a mill 

worker and three fingers missing to prove it. 

He asked what happened to your hand he 

asked. Oh, he said looking to his half hand. 

It’s been so long I forget, a stray bullet he 

answered but let’s not ponder on those times 

were out of that crazy war-zone for a time 

let’s celebrate and both soldiers held up their 

cans and said cheers, here’s to being out said 

Simon and three cans came together.

As the train thundered through the night

Peter felt at ease with the soldiers. No longer 

, enemies but friends, they laughed and joked 

and said how great Ireland would be without 

the hostility. They finished their rations of two 

cans each then bedded down for the overnight 

journey. Peter lay in the darkness unable to 

sleep amid the snores, after a time he fell over 

the weight of emotions and the journey 

fatigue took over.

Hours later he woke to the light on and the 

soldiers scrambling the compartment

Changing out of combats into civilian 

clothing, to get off at the next stop, Carlisle. 

They wished each other good luck

The train rolled on, peter felt alone again.

He switched off the light and fell into another 

sleep, it was as if he missed the comradery. 

The year was nineteen seventy-seven but it 

felt like the war was over.

Groggy and half-awake he climbed from the 

train, Euston station was partially deserted 

apart from a few people sleeping on the 

benches, some men and women who looked 

like they lived on the street.

A policeman and woman who looked out of 

character in their clean-cut complexations and 

sparkling uniforms.

He expected to see swarms of people, this

Being the big smoke then he looked at the

Station digital clock that read Sunday, 8 am. 

He walked into the empty station café

And was intrigued to see a young black girl

Behind the counter. I must have seen them 

before as a child born in Kent living in 

London but he couldn’t recollect. He ordered 

tea and a bacon roll, the girl placed his order 

on the tray, eighty pence please she said and 

reached out her hand for payment.

Peter looked to her open hand and burst into a 

fit of laughter, she looked to him in disgust. 

The hurt of a white boy laughing

Showed on her face, as the laughter died.

He apologized to the girl, sorry he said again 

vie just arrived from Ireland and I think 

you’re the first black person I have seen in the 

flesh, she still looked at him in annoyance. 

It’s not because your black

That I laughed, it’s just well this is going to 

sound rather stupid he went on his face 

flushed a deep red embarrassment.

I didn’t realize the palms of your hands are 

white, the girl laughed at his simplistic

Humour, I am really sorry if I offended you

I’m peter he said and reached out his hand, 

pleased to meet you Irish boy who speaks his 

mind, I’m Claudette. White hands she 

repeated and laughed again with

Peter as he laughed at his own stupidity.

Then handed the girl a pound note which she 

refused saying it is on the house, you paid 

already you made me laugh, he thanked three 

or four times before leaving the counter to sit 

in the empty café.

He was filled with kindness he never expected 

in the big city. I think my time here will be 

good he thought, it has started well with the 

soldiers on the train unexpected friends that 

were once his enemy and a nice black lady.

He ate and drank and waited just as he was 

stubbing out his fifth cigarette I the ashtray, he 

caught sight of his cousin going by outside. 

Only fifteen year’s old well stacked cheeked 

fit Irish construction worker.

He said goodbye to Claudette, the black lady 

and joined him. It took two buses

To reach their destination, his aunt Peggy’s 

house in Stoke Newington. Along the journey 

peters head darted this way and that the rest of 

his life away from his father who hated peters 

love for his mother. He was amazed at the 

mixture of different cultures on the street, 

people from every nationality, this is what 

Northern Ireland needs he told his cousin

It be make a great change from catholic and 

protestant.  They talked about the

Troubles, his cousin was intrigued with the 

sense of anarchy this being 1977, the punk 

era, the freedom of expression was loud and 

clear on the streets as groups of young people 

walked like avid fans of the mad max 

movies.

UNKNOWN

Trying to find form but

Detail doesn’t come.

All that I know is

Where I am from.

I can’t even retrace

The veins of embossed

Leaf, I can’t even write

This, it’s too deep.

THE DARK WEB

Me and the spiders crawl

Around this space, in and out

Of nooks and crannies around

The blue doors.  Nothing much

Goes on out there, the wheels

Keep turning and they burn rubber

Or burn themselves in war.

 

The webs have been wound, a wound

Glistening like a tear from a tear duct.

I retrace Jawlensky’s abstract head in

Picasso’s weeping woman, piecing them

together to weave a web of wonder.

CON-FUSED POME

Life is so confusing when you wake

One day without memory unable

To walk, talk, paralyzed in a wheel-

Chair and you spend a year in re-hab

Hospital learning to tie your own

Shoe laces, brush your own teeth

Wipe your own ass.  I don’t know

If my past was really my past.

My father was a bastard so

I don’t even know if my name

Is fox or Keogh.  I woke with no-

Thing on my mind like an infant

Locked in a moment, I have lived

That moment over and over again

For ten years now.

I don’t know if I’m coming or going.

The care system I live in does things

Their way my niece and my sons do

Things their way, I’m stuck in the muddle

Not knowing what’s right or wrong.

There are care companies, occupational physio

Therapists, key workers, floating support.

Somebody get me out of here, please.

I’m locked in a locked in syndrome but

Before all this I was a poet/teacher

But I have no memory of that so

All I have to go on are these words.

I’ve writ this umpteen times before

And I’ll write these umpteen times again.

I don’t have anything else on my mind

Only disability that has disabled me.

My father was a protestant baby left

At a blood red door or so the story goes.

I don’t know if it’s fact or fiction and I

Don’t want to know.  As I said before

I’m a walking contradiction but I can’t walk.

The truth becomes a lie.  He ended up

Fighting for the I.R.A. killing British soldiers

But he was once a British soldier.

So, you tell me, am I coming or going?

SUB-WAY TEXT

Give me a subway, my memory any-

Day, a cardboard city.  Memory is

Currency, let me get high on past vibes.

Pass through them for a free-ride.

I miss my friends and family, my child-

Hood, my sons not being born?

All day long I seep dark waters, the blues

follow me around, under-

standing, under-

ground.

ONE LOVE

Sunday morning coming down

God/Allah is making us drown.

We’ve got earthquakes in Mexico

And tornados tear us down

And we think of defense on military

Grounds.  The world is being ripped

Apart by nature and non-beings

And we do what is human to make

Hurt people sound, where is god

In all of this nowhere to be found

But we go back upon our knees

And pray it won’t come around, again

So, we rise to fall and rise to fall again.

While we scratch our heads, and pray

Millions have been slain cut down for

God and Allah, we don’t need disasters

We are one.  This world is a fucking dis-

Grace, the sooner I’m gone the better.

Then they can stick Christian ethics up

Their own dark matter.

FOLLOWER NOT

My father worked with a gun

And I am his bastard son.

Down the Barrell and magazine

The gun cocked his hard man tongue.

Expert, he would set the timer

It tore to shreds my poetic rhymer.

The sod exploded, shattered, breaking.

At narrow water, he was scheming

Just beyond no-man’s land I was dreaming 

peace. His eye narrowed broken ground

and I saw myself drown in his celebration.

Do you not know what you have done?

They are someone’s brother’s son.

Peace, his hate is in me and I want it out.

I threw my dinner on the floor and walked

Out the back door. This is what memory

Throws up, I’m glad I don’t recall it all.

Between the butt and the barrel

I stumbled his nail-bombed wake.

Fell sometimes on his harrowed sod

Never did he get me upon his back

Dripping in tainted blood.

I never wanted to grow and kill

To close one eye over a gun

I am not a follower, I have

My mother’s humanity will

I will do you no harm. Today

We live in peace but my father

The bleeding bastard behind me

will not go away.

KEY WORKER

I was thinking about something

My key worker said, ‘you haven’t

Accepted your illness.’ How does one

Accept an illness that takes away

One’s life?

I must make an excuse

To go on living, I must

Live in this hell-cell be-

Cause you believe a mickey-

Mouse story about a man

Of true conviction.

I can tell you a story of

A man of true conviction.

A man that lived and died

For his belief.  Literature

Is littered with them, can

I rise and live another

Day?

HYPE TYPED

All of us by Raymond Carver

is a gift from me to me.

I am trying to stay calm,

as I've run out of medication

and one of the tablets slows

my heart rate.  'I'm by 

the window with coffee

and the usual early morning stuff'.

I wouldn't call it happiness

would you?  Every syllable

is hype typed, smoking

my pipe, 'Now'.  I flick

open the stained dog-eared book

'any minute now something will happen'.

Withdrawal, this must be what

its like to be addicted, controlled

by substance, on the edge, dangling.

THE FOX (after Rilke’s Panther)

Back and forth he goes between

The kitchen and the mad room.

 His gaze behind vertical blinds is

like the bars of a caged animal.

So, exhausted it doesn’t hold a thing

No memory, behind a thousand bars

And behind the bars, no world.

He wheelchairs the space, over and over

The movement of his powerful chair

Is like a ritual dander around which

His will is paralyzed.

Only at times does his pupils rise, rushes

Down through the tense muscles

Plunges into the heart and be-

Comes a pome.

MEMORY STRIKE

I woke at five this morning and couldn’t get back to sleep but nothing came to mind, you see I have no moment glue. I live in a twenty-four moment, it’s like having amnesia.  My family doesn’t understand, even I don't under-stand.
It’s a form of dementia, my short-term memory flits back and forth and youcan’t put your finger on it, it’s like living life without action or reaction.

I picked up the remote to kill time and watch T.V.  I flicked the red button on but nothing happened.

At first, I thought the batteries need changed then I remembered I dropped it and ran over it in the wheelchair the day before, how do I remember this and not my childhood, my life is so trivial its scary.  

I’m like a child without progress in an adult body.  It must be so confusing for friends and family but a few good friends and one son and niece have stuck by me, I’d be lost without them.  Any wonder I get frustrated and aggressive it must be like my grandson’s frustration against his autism he’s lucky he has my son to take the edge away.  My long-term memory is shot to pieces, imploded, it’s in there somewhere.  I don’t think I’ll ever get it back now it’s been ten years since I took my stroke.  I know I repeat myself but I’m trying to get my head around this memory loss.  I thought some emotion or memory would have come back by now, it has got worse, I’m getting weaker by the day, it’s like watching yourself die. I watched hunger the film by Steve Mc Queen the monologue between Sands and the priest was powerful brought me to tears.  I can relate in part towards Bobby Sands despair, it was as if he projected himself beyond the republican movement.  Powerful and a very brave man, I feel his despair over thousands of days and I haven’t got the brits breathing down my neck oppressing me I am a brit oppressed breathing down my own neck. I’d love to end this nightmare but I haven’t got his balls.

Thank fuck for words even bad ones, words have pulled me back from the brink and saved my life.  When I picked up the remote I dropped my morning tablets and could not reach them.  One of the tablets calm me down slow my heart rate and stop me being aggressive oh fuck!  The power of words, they are as strong as a sleeping tablet or any chalky medication, maybe it is all in the head but only words can get it out?

CAPTURE MEMORY

Lou Reed, David Bowie and punk rock

Stopped us in our tracks, made us face fear.

Now were up and running again from what

I do not know, I’ve been stopped in my tracks

Stroke down blues.   Watching a wheelchair

Charger go from empty to full trying to

Capture memory.  Its lonely sitting here

Alone with music to guide me.  Seeing

A spider crawl unable to do anything but

Watch frozen to the spot waiting…

I didn’t grow up with Santa Clause, Mickey

Mouse wasn’t my friend.  Muttley was my

Friend a brown/white jack Russell snickering

Hound, with one eye and three legs beaten by

The brits with the butt of their guns.  Then he

Dies on the Castleblaney road, on the run.

You’re not glad the little dog died, you don’t want

To write a poem about him but your compelled.

Words come out of sadness to give you a lift, just

Before he ran under that van we were chasing cows

Running through lush grass.  This memory came out

Of the blue, poems come out of the blue.  Grief is

Standing there, an image from the darkness, being

There, I see life from an odd angle, it’s the shadow

In me.

A poem from an essay by Truman capote

THE WHITE ROSE

A silvery June afternoon in Paris
I’m standing in the courtyard
Of Palais Royal. I have an appointment
With the legendary artist, Colette.
She received me in her bedroom.
I was astonished. She looked precisely
as Colette should have looked.

Reddish, frizzly rather African- looking
Hair, slanting, alley-cat eyes rimmed with kohl:
A finely made face flexible as water…
Rough cheeks… rough thin and tense as wire
But painted a brazen hussy scarlet.
And the room reflected the cloistered
Luxury of her worldlier work-
Say Cheri and la fin de Cheri.

She handed me a piece of crystal
About the size of a baseball.
“it’s a Baccarat weight. It’s called
The white rose”. Occasionally I have
Give a weight as a gift. I protested
That I couldn’t accept such a gift
Something she clearly adored.

“my dear really there is no point
In giving a gift unless one 

Also treasures it.”

TROUBLED WATERS

This is my life just sitting her in a wheelchair reflecting on a life I don’t even remember.

I’m a strange fish lost in a bubble of perverted violent division.

In 2005, I took a massive stroke that almost killed me, I woke up in intensive care

And seen myself in my young son’s eye, I looked like a ghost, scared the crap out of me. 

I had lost all my long-term memory. So, what I’m writing here is not from memory but they are snippets written before I took the stroke that left me paralyzed unable to walk unable to talk.

I don’t know where to start so I’ll start at the beginning:  I was born in England of Irish parents

My mother from Rathmines in Dublin my father from north Belfast.

I never really got on with my father as he was a hard-con man and had no time

For a sensitive English boy. We moved to Belfast in nineteen sixty-seven, in hindsight I think

My father was running from his past, he was a bastard child you see an old school secretive man.

We lived for a time with his so-called mother in a two up two down in old Ardoyne, Herbert street

With an outdoor toilet beyond the entry that led to holy cross school playground the play-

Ground where I was bullied as a child until I learned to kick back against the hard man banter.

I was the little English boy schooled under the umbrella of the catholic church.

My first scenes from those windows was watching a cold lonely playground and a man being kicked to

near-death by the B-Specials seen beyond the image of a sacred heart of Jesus trickling blood from the

crown of thorns on his head, the house was full of religious icons.  Everyday after working in the mill

three fingered Sarah would kiss the alter of holy cross church, high on the hill above Ardoyne.

We stayed there and in green island until my father bought a house and car showroom just of the

Crumlin road.  A mixed area of three story houses that was until nineteen sixty-nine, when we became

what is known as a statistic of the troubles, living in holy cross school assembly hall.  That night I

watched Farringdon gardens go up in smoke, a whole street in flames like the greatest bonfire I had ever

seen.  Strange how I can remember tiny snippets of short term memory but no detail of my childhood

my eighteen-year marriage or my sons being born, nothing comes to mind.

In this memoir I’m trying to piece together the puzzle of my life from all the fragmented bits

I just hope you understand my fragmentation, I sincerely hope I do?

They were strange unreal times, I’m sometimes glad I don’t remember for they were dark times.

My published poems written before the stroke give me a way in, although they are had to read but they

are all I’ve got.  I think we must go back into the dark recesses of our minds to come out the other

side.  This is where it starts to get surreal not knowing if it’s true or false, all I know is I was there, I

think?

Bear with me through this jagged prose in the shadow of cave hill and the black hills above Belfast and

Beyond…  we moved into the safety of Ardoyne a nationalist enclave just of alliance avenue but safety

Was not in the game plan as my father was deeply involved in the republican movement so our home

was raided regularly by the British forces, they said my father was an I.R.A. treasurer and that there was

money behind the wallpaper so, I suppose that gave them cause to raid our home.  that was beyond me

I was fighting my own war on the street.  Each street had their own gangs trying to outdo the others.

I grew up with war all around me, I was destined to be a member of the I.R.A. and there were no two

ways around it, seeing twenty-four hour and forty-eight-hour gun battles, bombs and bullets

everywhere.

On the day in nineteen seventy-one when my father was released from jail, being the longest detainee

in Ireland, one was only to be detained for forty-eight hour’s but he was detained for nine months.

He was going on the run across the border and skipping bail and I was going with him because I was a

wild child and would end up dead, my mother said.  I called on my mate’s haggis and g.g. to tell them I

was going down south that’s all I could say, on the way home through the dark streets as all the street

lights were shot out.  I was caught in the middle of a gun battle, bullets were richocing of the ground at

my feet, I froze to the spot through fear, a man dragged me through a hedge backwards and threw me

over garden fences to get me home, I cried myself to sleep and the next day I heard he was shot dead.

So, I’m very lucky to be alive and writing this, I’ll never ever forget him, Brian Smyth

It’s as if those days are burnt into my memory.

Why do we remember the sad hard times?  Living in a little cottage with no light toilet or running water

Seven miles from Dundalk was magic for me, it got rid of the hatred and bitterness that had stored in me

in Belfast.  I saw there wasn’t war all around, in Belfast I thought the whole world was at war but here in

nature just beyond Kavanagh country I was free to roam the countryside, it took out the peaceful poet

in me, haystacks and cow’s were British soldiers.  After a time, we moved to the town Dundalk, I went to

school and found new friends, real life for a time was back to some form of reality.  My father’s still had

his dealings with the I.R.A. running guns across the border and working in a garage in town but I was

oblivious to all that, I was busy rebelling against the rebel, I ran away from home several times, trying to

escape his hold on me, me and my father hated each other isn’t that what

teenagers and fathers do?

I was having a hard time growing up, this was the early seventies the years of sexual confusion.

Between the ages of fourteen fifteen I was totally confused, I felt androgynous like David bowie

His song ‘Time’ when I heard it on Aladdin sane the lyrics of harsh reality blew my mind.

I didn’t think you could write the lyrics of him and Lou reed talking about giving head and falling wanking

to the floor, they gave me my teenage insight.

Before that I was so confused, I thought there was a smell coming of me the amount of men who

wanted to touch my tender sensitive side, they came out of the woodwork even my sister’s boyfriend.

For a time, I couldn’t get it straight in my mind.  I ended up beating one to a pulp my mates had to pull

me away I was going to kill him, his perversion created this demon in me.

We used to frequent this pool hall outside was an avenue of trees and I went outside to take a piss

behind a tree and this guy appears from nowhere and tries to grab me by the cock, well I chased him

through a school yard and got him in a kids shelter and I beat him with a plank the kids sat on I almost

beat him to death my mates dragged me away, I was shaking all over I realized later that I could have

killed that guy.  I’ve only ever felt like that once before when one the best fighters at holy cross Scholl

Was pushing me on the way home I turned and said I didn’t want to fight but he kept pushing me, I said

leave me alone, I was shaking inside, then he grabbed my parka coat and tore the hood off.

I beat him up and down that street not because he pushed me but because he tore the coat my mother

saved to buy me.  Just like that day I was lost in rage, I never wanted to hurt these people but I was not

one of them.  I never told my sister about her boyfriend coming on to me in a car travelling along the

motorway I said take your hand off my leg or I’ll jump out this door and we were doing over fifty miles

an hour but I was going to jump, the next day we woke on temporary mattresses he was helping us

move home, he took out his cigarettes and I said can I have one he said I’ll give you three if I can touch

your little brother, I got up with my brother in my arms and kicked him in the head saying you touch my

brother and I’ll kill you.  Men were coming out of the woodwork priests, teachers and van drivers

I thought there was something wrong with me, when I became sixteen it stopped.  Things went back to

normal, normal in my life was kicking someone’s head in, that was life in those strange times.

WISE WORDS

To thine own shellshock self be true

Even if your world is blue.

You can’t do two things at once

You’ve only got one hand, wise up!

There’s nothing new under the sun

Your father run guns on the run

From the brits out hoards he come.

You are you and you have won

So, print your words as one.

Back and forth 
forth and back
through the blogs 
of loneliness

1.

I never felt the beat of my heart until I was six years old, if I felt it before then it was only a faint murmur so, I take it that my first years were spent in peaceful innocence.  

Mum said I was a laid-back child if my high chair was piled with food, dad said I was lazy needed too much attention

suppose I was somewhere between both.

My heart beat like never-before, it felt like my body was vibrating with fear, reluctantly I stumbled up the mobile staircase, mother’s strength tugging my arm as I stopped taking in the sight of the massive steel bird, aeroplane, holding the rail, white knuckled like the branch of a tree when falling a life saver.  On reaching the platform my mother turned to me and reassure me that everything would be alright.  Seeing the fright written on my grimaced face and the buildup of tears, she took me in her arms, I clung to her like a leech so close our hearts entwined.  This was my first time on an airplane, flying to Belfast of all places with my head stuck in my second sick bag, as if I’d been given a premonition of what the future had in store, as if I knew that this heart beat would be the norm for thirty years, the year was nineteen sixty-seven.

HERO-IN

A sea shanty, elegy.  Going

from this land, here to that

rolled, pulled, prodded

and rolled.  The air

mattress undulates me.

Sick to the pit of my stomach

In my washed-out regalia.

I want to lay in velvet underground

Have this spoke with avant-garde.

Lou Reed and John Cale won’t be

Stood above but I see them hero-

In my mind’s eye.  This is a deep

Down elegy, droning, drowning

In my head.  Fifty years ago

You created a vessel that took

Me out on the high seas, reborn

A thousand years ago on a great

Big clipper ship.

Oh, and I guess that I just don’t know.