Day of the day of the great little dawn
Everything hanging has got to be worn
Girls going white at the door of the den
Jimmy asleep in his own little
room again
Day of the day you can cut out and keep
Big Ben is back at the sound of the beep
Tide coming in and the truth coming out
Timmy a king in his own little
kickabout
Day of the night of the meal of it all
Roses are red to the height of the wall
Violets are yellow you heard it from me
Sammy a scream in his own little
comedy
Grass to be cut to an inch of its self
Friends and relations and nobody else
Chatter to cease at eleven eleven
Bobby in luck in his own little
heaven-sent
Lottery holiday hot on the skin
Spoon he can see himself terrible in
Neighbours are singing it’s time to go home
Andy all set in his own little
aerodrome
Ice on a bender and fire on a spree
Holding a Q & A under the sea
Asking the end of the world for its pass
Sonny the sand in his own little
hourglass
Broadsword to Danny Boy, dust to dust
Everyone cheering and nothing discussed
Better the devil who’s got your back
Billy a blast in his own little
anorak
Doing the bidding of billionaires
Peacock and Scarlet descending the stairs
In frocks of the dead and not giving a shit
Tommy the toast at his own little
benefit
Table to table from here to the hills
The spreading of sauce and the grinding of mills
Stars of a century dying alone
Johnny all ears with his own little
megaphone
Asking the bees are you In or you Out
Settle the issue beyond all doubt
Settle the issue beyond all hope
Willy downwind of his own little
isotope
Bells to be rung for the wringing of hands
Flowers to be laid by the fans for the fans
Cliff on the cliff in traditional rain
Ronny at war in his own little
windowpane
Bluebirds and over a billion likes
Bobbies arriving on novelty bikes
In a meadow of poppies a meadow of men
Jimmy asleep in his own little
room again
Fox
Won’t do that thing we do and assume the fox
is grinning. Watch him break from a last snack
and saunter into limelight.
My thought’s as flat as his, for any time
he sets off for his needs in the night city
I and people like me
stop and think the same: you didn’t used to
act so frigging brazen. Is it something
we’re doing wrong or nothing
touching us at all? You walk a kerb
your kindred came to grief on, not a toss
gets given, were you not
shit-scared of light one time? Did you not need
a zigzag ingenuity to make
the chickens walk your walk?
We’ve literature that says you once did shy,
did plausible, sweet, biddable, polite,
but look at you by floodlight –
nothing you have time for but a wish list,
fat and soon, the churning stomach for it,
X to mark the spot.
Brief History Of Sport
Granted that your guess is as good as mine,
here’s mine. It happened like this in a vale in sunshine
or moonshine. What it was was one was gone
over the star- or sun-lit same horizon
gone, one gone whom we fear, we being some
who bide with our sheep and our sons in a land of some.
There was one long gone whom we fear, so a son we love
went off in pursuit as fast and not fast enough
as he could, to the far horizon, was seen there
hurling his spear at one long gone, we were out there
watching him, he would hurry and hurl his spear,
follow it, find it, step with it high and from there
hurl it at one long gone till will please someone
tell him? Still he’s hurling his spear at no one.
Sticking a stick like a stake on the horizon
to build on, to build what on, wondered someone
as we carried his body back, he was as light as
a light on the horizon, he was fine as
we could frame the words for, we were delving
deep for them, we piled them all then nothing
over the hole we dug him, and we stood there
three, we stood there three, and we were good there –
or one was good, I mean, and you were better –
but I was best at wishing this day had never
been, they brought me gold and brought you silver
and I sold it to live far from you, where over
and over the rain rains spears on the fist-thick panes
and your prayer is as good as mine unless mine wins.
Anniversary
Everywhere you are
the Wall came down. Everywhere you’re not
they build the Wall at night.
Everywhere you look
there are colours. Everywhere you don’t
look there’s black and white.
The Other Side
The other side said things the other side would say
because they’re them they gathered here last Saturday
and good luck finding them they’ve vans they’re miles away.
The other side took everything we know is true
and twisted it and why they pull the shit they do
we cannot fathom friend it’s why we’re asking you.
The other side must hate us why would anyone
we’re angels we mean well we have a battle on
if they can’t see our wings all fucking hope is gone.
The big old thing we serve has got its big old head
in both its big old hands and all the big old dead
we’ve spoken to are down with what we’ve always said.
The other side are lost we’ll do our level best
to guide them for unlike their kind our kind are blessed
by that same big old thing we serve you know the rest.
In case you don’t the song we sing the prayer we pray
the flag we fly the badge we sport the hell to pay
our fathers’ fathers’ fathers died to be this way.
If life has nights enough to meet the other side
we’ll wait that long the pot is whistling get inside
my friend if friend you are I hope so you decide.
The Cream And The Crop
Before the end here come the helpless creatures
bloated with simplicity: some cream,
some crop, all knowing only cream or crop.
The cream can pity life its paralysing
histories in shade, but won’t enact
the acts of pity for a raft of reasons.
The crop can barely speak for the desire
to bawl delight at how the cookie crumbled.
Their open mouths are hollering like tunnels.
The cream are not
