Cud

People go about their lives,
Always going somewhere,
And always chewing.
Chewing their cud
Like cows.

Always chewing something,
Gum, tobacco, worries,
Its all the same, really.

But sometimes,
Even among all the strangers,
While I'm walking among the cows,
I can still smell her perfume.

Regrets

You perch on that same stool
Every day, it seems.
Like a bird on a telephone wire
Over a street crowded with cars.

Smoke hangs heavily around your head;
You don't smoke, but it seems everyone in here
Is always smoking. At least,
They are while you're there.
Who knows what goes on in the bar
When you're gone?

You're perched on that same stool
Sipping at your usual gin and tonic,
A little extra gin, a thin slice of lemon
Floating on top. Like a sun
On the sea of ice cubes.

You wait, as always, for the inevitable.
And, as always, he appears.
Sometimes he's black,
Sometimes he's white.
He can take many forms,
But never the same one twice.

He slides up next to you,
You let him buy you another drink.
He starts his talk; a monologue
That you hear almost every day.
So that you almost have it memorised,
And can correct him if he skips a line.

You sit, and you listen,
And you accept a third drink,
And maybe even a fourth,
Before he finally gets to the point.

You make your way with him back to his place.
Sometimes you walk, sometimes you'll take a taxi.
Sometimes he might have his own car, and,
If he didn't drink much,
He might be able to drive it.

You stand at the door as he fumbles with his keys,
And there is always a moment,
Where you're caught in indecision,
Stuck like a rabbit staring into the eyes
Of an oncoming car.
You wonder if this is what you really want,
If this is how you want to live.

But, as usual, the door opens and you step inside.
And you never get a chance at regret;
Not as you step over the threshold,
Not as you undress,
Not as he lights a cigarette,
Not as you're sitting in the taxi
On your way home.

And as you sit in the back of the dirty, yellow taxi,
The bird on the telephone line spreads its wings
And flutters away into the smokey night.

So What?

So maybe I'm generic.

So I might be the same as the next guy

Who comes along and sits down next to you

At some stuffy bar, the same one you're always at,

The one you where the bartender could be

Your biographer, you've already told him enough,

Maybe I slide up next up next to you,

Order you another drink,

Get you talking,

Maybe even listen to what you're saying.

So what?

So maybe you've heard the same speech

A hundred times before.

Maybe you've even memorised it,

And you correct them if they miss a line.

Does that mean that it is untrue?

Does that mean that every time you hear it

It is all a lie? Always a lie?

Just because something is cliche,

Doesn't mean its meaningless.

If I came up to you in that bar,

And told you you were nothing.

That your life was worthless.

That your dreams would never come true.

That everything you loved

Made you a bad person,

How would you feel?

Because that is what I feel.

That is what you said to me.

And there comes a point

Where saying, 'so what?'

Gets tiresome.

And so you resign to saying, 'so true.'

So I lay down my pen,

I fold away my papers.

I close the lid on my piano,

I shut the door to my room.

I hang up my suits,

I clear out my office.

I take whats left and throw it

Into the river.

All that remains is me.

And I might as well follow whats left.

Watching

It is not an easy job
Being an adolescent.
Always the butt of jokes,
Looked down upon by society,
They call us the future!
And they try to model us,
To shape us into what they
Wish they could be
In the future.

Where is the individual?

We are no more than
Continued legacies
Of a failed generation.
We are doomed to learn
From their mistakes,
Rather than make our own.

There is no way to step
Out of line in this world,
No way to live your own life,
Because there's always someone
Watching, waiting to pull you back,
Waiting to bring you back to the path.

Everyone is watching,
Everyone is being watched.
There is no freedom.

Flowers, Killed In The Name Of Peace

If you want peace, you prepare for war.

You suit up, you load your guns,
You pull on your boots, and you go.

You divide while talking of unity.

You imprison with the dream of freedom.

You kill in the name of a better life.

You drop your bombs, you fire your guns,
And all the while,
You say you're doing the right thing.

You say that God is on your side.

You do evil with the promise of good.

This is not the image you want;
And yet, at the same time,
You don't want to let it go.

Because you have power,
And isn't that what everybody
Wants?

An Autumnal Day

There's something about the smell of smoke
On a cold morning
That tells me its time.

The seasons have now officially changed,
From Summer, to Autumn.

There is a certain beauty in tossing up
Leaves, which are no longer leaves,
After I ran them over repeatedly with a lawnmower.

Now they are leaf-flakes,
And they dance through the air
Like snowflakes in the breeze.

There is a certain joy in being submerged in leaves.
The smell is warm and earthy,
As are the leaves themselves,
If a little scratchy at times.

There is something calming about
Long sleeves,
Wheelbarrows,
Falling leaves and laughing children,
That reminds me of home.

November Second

It didn't rain today.
At least, I didn't see any rain,
And nobody told me it rained,
Nobody came up to me and said
"It's raining, you know?"
So as far as I know
It didn't rain today.

I'm really not sure if anything happened.
I woke up pretty late, then stayed in bed.
I had breakfast, then had lunch
Half an hour later.
Some guy didn't call my dad back.

Could have been the same guy
Who didn't reply to my e-mail.
Who knows?

I didn't go out, so I couldn't tell you
How nice the weather wasn't
For this time of year.

Not that I would tell you that
Anyway.

Mum's been in all day,
Writing reports.
Putting in so much effort
Into something that has
A somewhat small chance of being read
Or cared about.

But she labors on, because it's what she does.

Cat still can't walk,
But he'll be OK. Give him time
And he'll be OK.

There is no meaning, really,
Is there?