Long Kilns Poems

Stars fall under failing skies...stars fall...stars fall...
But stars do not cry.
Into Ochs valley, through the Vale of White Horse...prancing 
besides a Dragons Hill;
It was here that a Roundhead - did a Royalist Cavaliers blood in...

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First draft 

I

By his deeds he was duly judged
And by his greed he was condemned
To the bowels far beneath the Earth-
Cursed tenfold to rot and feed the maggots unfed.

Stark Kilns was his doomed name
A man...

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The March of Madness has begun,
                             ...

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I am the son of Britain and Californian
     Reared of Europe and the American Revolution
Progeny of English countryside and Frisco Bay
     Yet despite all I have come...

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A week of summer heat
with no cooling breeze
or break made bedrooms 
like brick kilns 
still hot after a day's firing.
You couldn't sleep.
Air conditioning back then
was a couple of loud,
clunking fans that blew
a hum of hot...

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Dear old woman who lives in a shoe
The dear old woman who’s house is a shoe 
For Christmas she doesn't know what she can do
She can't afford beer for seasonal cheer
And her kids will have...

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Platform breezes,
spitting rain,
red brick station,
vintage train.
Take a seat,
relax with ease.
Conductor's voice,
'Your tickets please'

Time to leave,
the whistles cry,
release of brakes,
hydraulic sigh.
Boiler stoked,
the pressure's high,
clouds of steam
feed hazy sky.

Pace increases,
prospects vast,
golden sun,
then shadows cast.
Tunnel vision,
fortunes passed,
speed illusion,
double...

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The skyline merges with the sky.
As I observe kilns and ovens high,
Their smoke rising up to the clouds,
In a heated chamber, pollution enshrouds

The furnace roars with fiery heat.
And I wonder if our planet will ever...

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The moon shone on the water
Dyed ochre by the iron mines. 
Centuries of men have toiled 
In trenches and in chines. 
Carving through the sheer rock face
To tunnel under hills
Canals to link the land of...

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There was the hunger
and suicide.
In favor of my brutal truth
or virtue of my failure,
I do not want any comments on my trauma.
Morality has a dubious equation
with power, provoking my anger.

The days were full of abandoned...

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There was the hunger
and suicide.
In favor of my brutal truth
or virtue of my failure,
I do not want any comments on my trauma.
Morality has a dubious equation
with power, provoking my anger.

The days were full of abandoned...

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Dark place

my place

standing water

violin frogs...so very quiet.



Where is my voice

where are the lungs

flung into wells of fire

another day for the kiln

another day    somewhat overdone.



the meaning of "whole" has paled,

half a heartbeat shy...

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when once my clay hands began to harden
 under the potters wheeled sun 
 i turned to reach for my shadow 
 but found only a basket of dried
 yesterdays and tomorrows.

 when once my...

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