Burst Banks

One mean promise that bursts its banks, causing
Two tides to roll steadily down either
Hill before they come together in the
Crevice underneath a mouth that speaks too
Much and fails to do enough. Walking the
Streets of Dublin, crying about living
And dying alone when a louder cry
Pierces the air and my eardrums - I turn
In hope only to find that a machine’s
Brakes cry louder than I do, earning the
Attention of passers-by more than a
Fellow human being can only wish
For, and once again I gaze across the sea,
Believing all is greener on distant
Shores, despite the news telling me different
Everyday. Ignorance is easier
Because giving up would mean allowing
This sea to swallow me whole,
Combining the streams on my cheeks with the
Relentless assault of wave after wave,
Until I end up isolated on
An island, truly alone, and with no
Way out except to lie down and close my
Eyes, lost in happier times with better
People who did quite well to disappear.

Fuelled Fire

I fuel a fire that never needed
A match to strike its first flame, screaming in
Agony everyday while nobody
Ever hears because it is locked within
My ribcage, now bruised from the vibrations.
It is the time spent idle that kills me
Because it is then thoughts wander along
Past paths that should be blocked off forever.

I stand alone, pacing the path,
Outside the old folks’ graveyard, waiting for
A friend’s shift to end, when all I can hear
In the rustling of a nearby tree’s leaves
Is death - simple and free, paralysing
The pain of living the same fiery
Lies everyday because they need the light.

Rankle

Agitation of my wringing hands haunts
Those around me as my voice shrills higher.

Thickened glass drowns yells they wish to ignore
As the situation becomes dire.

Simplicities of intimacies lost
Still rankle as the world holds out on me.

Gaping mouths and tear-stained cheeks plead in vain
To deaf ears as I refuse to wait and see.

Taken flights and clouds of ash restrict my
Breath as my friends’ pleas begin to cower.

Cigarette stubs and empty cans litter
Life like indifference without power.

The long walk back to the start goes awry
As the path vanishes before my eyes.

Keep them open, keep on walking because
It is all so short, are their anguished cries.

Pleasantries and patience, all I extolled
As I dreamed of reaping returned rewards.

Yet here I sit empty-handed as I
Realise that we all fall on our own swords.

Red Moon

Conversation carries us along the
Dark backroads of Portmarnock, and with no
Lights to guide us home we jog the whole way,
Not in fear but lost in freedom only
Solitude can bring. A glance to our left
Shows a big red orb hanging in the sky,
The moon watching tenderly over us
In its unusual shade; a glance to
Our right shows a field with once endless
Expanse now slowly dwindling as
Empty apartments creep closer to these
Narrow, pathless roads. Yet the changing scene
Does not bother us as we run, for in
These moments the tedious, painful words
We exchanged about a past resting in
Futility and a future that could
Be just the same fall away. We run in
A different time, seeing the pitch where we
Grew up together, defender and goal-
Keeper, protecting the honour of a
Team that never had one to begin with.
We recall the old man with his Sunday
Finest and his cigarette addiction,
Memory lapses, temper tantrums and
Unbelievable passion for a game
That eventually attacked his heart,
Ending their love affair. The liberty
Of youth on this nostalgia run takes us
All the way to Donaghmede, where, once the
Running ceases, all the complications
Of the present catch up to us again,
And you vomit, mostly from drunkenness,
But partly in disgust, as the truth that
Those days are over hits again under
The glare of the ever watchful red moon,
Bloody with pity for our blissful plight.


(running home along isolated and empty backroads in the dark with a friend brings a freedom unattainable elsewhere - but it was only a brief reprieve as you cannot outrun life)

Chamber

I have a chance to die here, all alone,
Overcrowded beach of faceless strangers,
But I run away, leaving my friends to
Die there instead, solving nothing at all.
In reality, the isolation
Chamber I constructed for you, that we
Joked about, was made really for me
To hide behind, so I could watch the joy
Of your life without disrupting its free
Chaos filled essence, conflicting and cold.
Your eyes in which I deign to lose myself
Are set soulfully on another man,
Invisible and imaginary,
Whom I do not know, yet envy still.
Our shared kiss is dead in the annals of
History, forgotten by you because
It was a footnote in your weekly game
Of who next? It yellows within my mind,
Tearing at the edges as I fight to
Grasp that feeling of meaning something to
Somebody once more, when the truth is
I never did, because they all run away,
Empty words floundering in fear behind.
My time is spent chasing indifferent
Shadows daily and nightly, waiting to
Catch one and never let it go, because
The order attained in books and films will
Finally be mine when I do, even
Though the stories written for amusement
And entertainment are written only
To cash in on manipulation.
They are not real and they never will be,
So this hope to achieve the scene-set end,
Of taking you on the beach as the waves
Whisper, telling us that the world has stopped
Spinning, is futile, because this chamber
Is designed to prevent, not to create.


(the last poem ever to go on Bebo).