Selected Poetry

In playful oceans where the waves roam.
Forests full of trees with beds made of stone.
Over the sea and under the sky.
The purpose of life is to live and die.
By and by we come and go.
Ere the break of morning, we begin to know.
That all are soon to rise and set again.
Most things in life are just pretend.
What’s real can’t be seen until it’s too late.
And that’s why in death we celebrate.
What life was now that it’s gone.
What was right now that it’s wrong.
Who was who and what it was to be.
The losses in life are what make it poetry.
The first grief.

“What is love?” The Caterpillar asked the Mockingbird one afternoon atop the tree they shared,

“Love is the wind against your face and the open skies at your reach. Come I shall show you” it replied and then flew away,

But the Caterpillar could not fly after it, for it was landlocked without the wings the Mockingbird had been blessed with,

And soon the Mockingbird had disappeared completely leaving the Caterpillar alone atop the tree,

As it peered up longingly at the open sky it came to a conclusion,

“Love is selfish”.

The next morning the Caterpillar met a lone Ant who was making its way down the tree with a crumb almost twice his size hoisted on his back,

“What is love?” The Caterpillar asked it as it passed by,

The Ant lifted its head, straining from the burden of the crumb on its back and replied,

“Love is duty, to work and protect the ones you care about”,

As it crawled off once more the Caterpillar said to itself with a scoff,

“Love is tedious”.

That very afternoon whilst the Caterpillar was indulging itself on the many juicy leaves its tree had to offer it spotted a Squirrel banging an acorn against the trunk of the tree,

The Caterpillar, curiously watching the Squirrel work away at the acorn posed to it the very same question,

“What is love?”

The squirrel looked up from its task, tilting its head and said “Love is the thing that lays hidden within something”,

Finally, the acorn cracked open and the Squirrel dashed away to feed its family,

As the Caterpillar watched the Squirrel dart off it saw that although the acorn it carried meant nothing to the Caterpillar, it was the duty the Squirrel held as a means of feeding and protecting its family,

The breaking of the acorn was tedious,

But what was inside meant the prosperity for the ones it loved,

As the Caterpillar sat and watched it whispered to itself,

“love is beautiful”.

That night the Caterpillar wrapped itself up in a tight cocoon,

For the day had been long and it needed rest,

And the very next morning the most beautiful of butterflies arose in its place,

With a single flap of its golden wings, it took to the open skies where it let the radiance of the sun wash over its new body,

And as it floated away in the soft breeze it looked down at the tree that had once been its home and said,

“Love is freedom”.

A pillow with a heartbeat
You can hear it thumping against your ear
You close your eyes and drift away
To the rhythmic beating that beats like a drum
A marching band on its way somewhere else
Comforted by a bosom on bad days
A hand against my head glides through my hair
I was just a boy and all was ok
Comforted by a beating heart that didn't belong to me
As it rains cats and dogs outside
Thunder rumbles and lighting strikes
I lay under a soft light
And drift away into dreams all night.

I wonder what he thinks about
At night when he’s alone
Or in the engine rooms that he works in underground
Groaning and churning
Eating up all the silence
I wonder what he thinks about
At night when he’s alone
Listening to laughter on the street
Party goers on their way home
He was never one for parties
The loud noise made him feel sick
Long nights full of loneliness
Softened with hard drink
I wonder who he was thinking about
All those years in silence
Remembered only by him
At night when he is alone.

You'll never find love if you go searching for it,

Love is too elusive for that,

You could never hope to lock love in a cage,

It would slip through all the gaps,

You could freeze love in a photo,

But in time those memories would make you sad,

And if you ever take love,

Then you should be prepared to give it back,

And love all things as they are,

That's the way love attracts.

A bloke came to my market stall one Sunday,

Shirtless and in boardies,

He was covered in faded tats,

His skin was leathery and his hair was grey and matted by salt,

He hobbled on a broken toe,

Black and blue in the sun,

He asked me what the fuck I was doing

I told him poetry and he laughed

And asked me for one

I wish I could remember what it was,

And when I gave it to him he gave me 500 dollars,

I refused but suddenly he grew serious,

And told me he was the richest man in the world,

And that he wanted to help me with my poems,

And my publishing company peanut prints,

He told me that it had taken him 6000 years to find me,

I told him that I appreciated it, and politely refused his help,

Before he left he asked me if I had a number for weed,

I gave him mine and then he left,

The next day he called my phone from an asylum,

Someone ratted him in and four cops took him away,

But he still wanted to help me,

I was uneasy and he could tell,

So he hung up, and I never heard from him again.

I often wonder if he was God.

Theres an empty chair that sits under a soft light,

An old man used to sit there but now he’s gone,

No one has sat there since and it stands alone,

Waiting to be sat on,

You pass by and notice it there,

And the sight intrigues you deeply,

You wonder where the old man went,

And although you think of the obvious a part of you knows he’s still out there somewhere,

You wonder if he misses his chair,

Sometimes that’s all we think of during big journeys,

Our favourite chair or the softness of our own beds,

Things to look forward to on the road to nowhere,

The light coming through the window in the morning,

The wind rattling against them in a big storm,

The heat and steam from a nice warm shower,

Stretching your legs out in bed after a long day,

I wonder if the old man does all those things,

I don’t know his name or I would ask him,

I wonder where he went,

And I wonder when he’ll be back to sit on his chair again,

Along the road to nowhere.