Goldfish.

Well...Yeah....Goldfish are important too I guess...I don't know what inspires a lot of what I write, but I like goldfish anyway.

I am a goldfish.

I am small and insignificant.

I have one life and it is short, unimportant and fragmented by my own memory.

In the grand scheme of things,

It would be easier for you to flush me

Than it would be to pick me up,

Take me home,

Care about me.

He was bored,

As usual,

And his feet get itchy,

Staying in the same place for too long.

He decided to go for a drive,

And it was beautiful;

Peaking at sixteen degrees,

Highest it had been for at least four months.

He took a chance on the roadside,

When he saw the lights

And the stalls;

As usual, he didn’t really care

That he was on his own.

"Roll up, roll up."

He did.

He tossed the ring.

Time stopped.

Somebody, somewhere, made the decision,

What would happen, why it would happen.

Knocking the world off balance.

It bounced off of the peg.

The vendor shrugged,

Throwing a lop sided grin as some sort of apology,

Allowing him to choose his booby prize.

A selection of soft toys,

Bubblegum, sweets, a paddleball,

A deck of cards.

At the back of the stall were a selection of bags,

Filled with water,

And orange segments,

Placed in the shade

So they wouldn't overheat,

Or glint too much in the sun,

And blind the punters.

He shrugged once more, stepped back and let him look;

Perhaps it was fate,

That he chose the one he did,

It wasn't like the rest,

But he saw the beauty in it all the same.

He smiled.

I am a goldfish.

I am small and significant.

I have one life and it is short, but important.

In the grand scheme of things,

It would be easier for you to flush me

Than it would be to pick me up,

Take me home,

Care about me,

But you care anyway.

ransom note.

I am holding my love ransom.
Maybe for a week or two,
It isn't a necessity to you,
Like you are to me.
The snake on my back found its way to my chest,
And it's fork tongue unravelled
And fed it's way around my heart like a belt,
And it squeezed until I couldn't take it any longer.
You'd think it was impossible,
To think about one person so much.
I am holding my love ransom,
How long will it last,
Against you and your charming smile?

God created Jammy. and she's good.

In the beginning, God created Jammy.

And she was without form, a faint flicker of potential; potential that could be bottled into one individual and distinct package that made up all beings.

And God said, Let there be flesh: and there was flesh. And God saw the flesh, that is was good: and God divided flesh from bone. A body was formed, and he became content as he spread pale skin over bone and flesh. And the evening and the morning were the first day.

And God divided the flesh and the bone to make limbs; moulding them into proportion, enabling his creation to take the first tenuous steps alone, proud that the limbs could withstand their function. And the evening and the morning were the second day.

And God shook his head with the restlessness and clumsiness of her, he presented her with the gift of senses; plucking colours from nature and mixing them to a fine green, becoming to her face, allowing her to see herself, God's creation for the first time. He gave her a nose, a mouth with a warm and gracious smile and ears that appreciated the gift of sound.

And God, not content with the appearance of her, pulled fine strings and vines from the trees and placed them atop her head. The creation shrugged her shoulders, staining the vines with red, and she was content with her involvement. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.

And God began to enjoy interacting with his creation, proud, gaining an appreciation and love for such beauty. Pronouncing that, to accompany her qualities, she needed more; and so, gave her the final gift of a brain and a personality. A shining attitude that was welcoming and forgiving, but with enough of the same spark of potential he saw in the beginning to be strong, to stand up for herself and to be an individual. And the evening and the morning were the fifth day.

And God watched what he had made, and it was very good. For what he did not anticipate when she spoke to him, a first, melodic call; not that of a dove or anything similar, but something unique and better because of this. And this, the moment when God's creation took his breath away.

The Duck Egg

Blue backed smile,
Toothless grin.
Fingerprints smoothing the curves;
Covering the scratches beneath.
It was a rough upper cut,
Knocking him right between the eyes,
Because they can't see him the way I do.
Under a fixed smile
And smudged, moulded lines,
White speckles,
Large freckles plaguing bobbled skin;
A duck egg, but not so, not as sweet,
Not that cuddly, baby blue,
But a deepness, like that of a lake,
A guarded, cold blue
Haunted.

He stands, a hand quavering up and down his face,
Nestling in an ever decreasing hairline,
He finally did it.
And He likes it this way;
On his own with a vast plane of anything,
Unamazed by it;
As long as it keeps the advancing space between him and the rest of the world.
An almost twilight sky closing in on him,
And the promise that, as it did,
He would find himself lucky to be alive tomorrow.
He appreciates it.

A dent in the silence leaves him to wander,
Not one for venturing,
He perches on a chair.
In front of the stairs,
Under the window,
Close enough to the kitchen to be shaken by the hum of the fridge,
All to observe to stars,
As he always did.
The moon threw shadows against his whitewashed face,
And made the clock spin, dizzily, showing many times at once.
As the stars shook themselves,
Hooking onto the dark blanket of the night,
Like bats, waiting for food, a victim.

Solitary, which here meant, a relished feeling,
A wrapped up, warm emotion,
Rather like that first overwhelming "I love you more than chocolate" feeling,
You got when you were a child,
That first thought that takes your breath away,
Something that you never thought could happen,
Don't understand,
But enjoy, in a strange way.

Light charged from the clouds,
Churning up the wheat,
Moulding the sky into a sinister pool,
Swirling the moon, cutting it into pieces,
Separating like rice in a pan,
Or a smashed mirror.
It was a reflection of himself,
A reminder of decisions he had made;
Something he detested,
The inevitable hermit crab.
On finding something that was not 'ordinary' in himself,
Hiding from it all, including those ugly,
Deep insecurities,
Like scars, they wouldn't leave him.
He threw off his shell,
Started anew,
Had a chance living with the 'sea slugs',
Who saw their faults, but hid behind nothing,
But, becoming afraid, he retreated back to the familiar.

He felt changed,
No longer his dark, deep blue,
Mysterious and interesting;
Instead, a mustard yellow,
The sickeningly, cowardly yellow.
Transformed from a possibility,
Sinking swiftly beneath the water,
Waiting for an opportunity to rise to the surface.
Now, the underbelly of the serpent,
Misunderstood,
Deceptive and evil?
The apple now rotten to the core,
Seeds remained healthy,
Willing and wanting of change,
A chance to finally prove something,
Hidden and buried beneath skin and flesh,
Ever hurtful reminder of surrendered possibilities.



Thank you Katt and Jammy for teaching me to spell serpent :) .. And I know you said it was pips, not seeds, but seeds sounded better :P

My favourite thing in my room.

The telephone
That perches on my shelf
Signals two times;
One past, one present.
An advance in technology;
An ability
For all things
To be reproduced
And sold in bulk,
For those who take a fancy
Of the 'retro' and 'kitch'.
Little phone
Feels unappreciated
With ten thousand
brothers and sisters
And parents who own so much
And care for naught,
Perhaps with the exception
Of their prodigal son;
Money.
He comes and goes,
Makes them elated one moment
And deflated the next,
But they love him
Not caring what he puts them through.


Little phone
Cries out for attention
For a time when all little phone's looked like him
That my parents were born and met in.
They smiled at my Little phone
And picked him up and took him home
And gave him to their youngest daughter
And didn't realise they had bought her
A Little phone with sixties character
That fit the space on the shelf
And with the music that she loved
Perfectly.


Little phone,
Reminded that daughter of a man
Who had taught her a lot
Who has witnessed all of these times
And still laughs as though he's the same age as her.


A while ago,
When both of us
Could snuggle comfortably together
In your lap,
You could de-weed the garden,
And shout about the dissappearance of your 'spuds',
You looked at me and smiled,
Thinking you were superman, to me.
You still try to keep the appearance
Although your muscles and bones
Give you away,
Your back hurts
And your legs are sore,
You still let me sit on your lap
Make me laugh
With anecdotes that make me miss
Times I wasn't born in
And I smile
When you keep your £20 notes
Because you think they're 'pretty'.
Talking to your sister,
She tells me about how,
When she was little,
You used to give her your rations for sweets
Because you didn't eat them
(And I know it's a lie,
But you love her so much you didn't care)
How when she was born
And the nurse told you that you had a sister
You asked her to take her back,
Because you already had a 'stupid' sister,
How you laughed when your son, Tony,
Reversed your friends car
Into a telephone pole
When he was four.
I can see when he talks to you
He thinks you're superman too.


Little phone,
You are just half a year old
I want you to know that you are appreciated;
Remind yourself
You are loved.




I don't know what inspired this...but yes; I love my Little phone...and my Grandad :)

These small hours.

At the beginning of the holidays, we were asked to think about death; what we think will happen and what we want to happen. Death has affected me in this holiday in different ways; my brother was recently taken to the doctors and told he had a virus; rest, fluids and all that. Last night, after hearing much hushed talking from the lounge accompanied by my mums panicked voice; which, to be honest, isn’t all that rare. He wandered into my room, pushing his back towards me asking me to look at it; what appeared to be a red rash had formed over his right shoulder blade, my sister followed him in mouthing to me that they thought he may have meningitis and were taking him to the hospital. After they left, my sister put on a movie for us about hockey; hockey is my favourite sport and I can’t watch enough of it, so I even surprised myself when I found I wasn’t watching, but staring through the TV or looking to the door. Luckily for all of us, it was merely a scare, where he had been coughing so much he had strained some blood vessels in his back creating the appearance of a rash. The relief I felt to have him home with us safe was unbelievable, up until this point I had never really understood the saying, you don’t appreciate something until it’s gone; of course, I understand what it’s trying to say, but I feel it’s something you have to experience, like how people always talk of love and say that if you aren’t sure if it was love then it wasn’t or something like that, I think it’s the same basic principle. My brother and I, like most other siblings, fight like cats and dogs, in our family this is something particular to me and him; him and my sister get along like a house on fire; when they came home he bundled himself close to me on the sofa and I revelled in having that time with him, it was like getting another chance and we chatted and laughed over the movie much to the disapproval of my sister.

Others, however, are not so lucky; at the same time I was laughing with my brother, calmed and reassured by his safety, another boy was fighting to survive. Today, we were told that a friend of ours had died; a boy my sister had known since she was five; we’d stayed close over the years, my mother and his were good friends also, her two daughters were around my age and in the summer we would travel up there to go to the pub and have lunch together. For me, this is the first person that I knew relatively well to have died; I’m lucky enough to have all of my grandparents still living and well, so this was almost earth-shattering. I couldn’t comprehend how the boy who I had, just a few short years ago, played on the star wars game with and watched TV with was gone, he was just a kid.

For whatever cosmic reason there is for existence, I don’t understand it. At this moment in time, I am an agnostic, unsure whether or not to believe in a higher power; not to say that I will do the same as any person who has lost someone and ask this higher power “Well, if you exist, why did you take so-and-so from us? You obviously don’t exist.” That isn’t how it works. I think there are things we can’t explain, perhaps it’s the brain slipping up or maybe its true, for now I don’t know; I don’t know if I believe in ghosts or past lives yet. Personally, I would whole-heartedly love to believe there was a higher power, what a relief that would be. But that is my point; relief; is there any other reason, but the fear of death and to explain the (rapidly decreasing) unexplainable? I am so afraid of death. This is probably one of the first times I have admitted it, but today, with all that has happened, I want to be honest. I think about death at least once a day; I think I have done since I was about ten years old; I used to sleep in the car merely because if we had a crash, at least I would die in my sleep, how I wanted. I know I do it, and probably, unwittingly let it control my life. People don’t want to think about it, we are afraid of the unknown and death is the king of the unknown; it is scarier as it is the one thing in life that not one of us can change or avoid. I hope that one day I can be okay with it, I would love to get tired of it and be able to say genuinely, as my grandmother does “I never want to get THAT old! Hope I go before then..” While laughing and nudging my grandchildren in the side…But, for now, I guess I’m just not that brave. And I think a lot of people would be the same.   

Old love, New love, Red love, Blue love.

She was the one

Who brushed her hair

Who put on the lipstick

Had a crush on the younger brother

But spent the evening with the older brother

Giggled along

With the gossip

And cared for those

That cared back

The one that appeared to be

One of ‘those’ girls

If you didn’t look closely

But was really the other way around

She was the one

Who would laugh

If it was funny

Who could cry

If it hurt

Who wasn’t afraid to show

She was the one

With a heart

He was the one

With the glasses

Perched on his nose

Who, could be said to

Give too much

And want nothing back

Who was a gentle soul

Who sat on the grass

With his best friend

And punched the kid

Who was mean to him

He was the one

Who was the “good” boy

He was the one

Who people knew

They could depend on

She was the one

Who trusted her friend

And took the ride

From the guy

She’d met a few times

Who she thought was nice

Who she felt she’d known

Her whole life

He was the one

Who took them skating

He was the one

Who may have been

A little bit

Oblivious

And followed his friend

To the chip shop

Instead of walking her home

Oblivious

To her disappointed face

She was the one

Who linked their arms

As they crossed the road

And never looked back

Knowing once and for all

That she had

The one

They were the ones

Who got married

Who bought the house

Where putting up your white picket fence

Wasn’t allowed

Who had a baby girl

And another

And watched them grow

Ride the bike

Win the trophy

Bring home

And kill

The school plant

Who begged

And begged

To get a dog

And name it Helen

They were the ones

Who shocked them all

With the baby boy

That burst in

And started the cycle

All over again

Ride the bike

Win the trophy

Bring home

And kill

The school plant

Fitting in

Like the wave

The ocean didn’t know

It was missing

They are the ones

That can make their children

Run in terror

When they kiss

After all this time

That can make

A house a home

That met in a car

With pillows in the back

Over Twenty five years ago

To those of you who know my parents, this coming year is their 25^th wedding anniversary. At the beginning of this year, they were considering renewing their vows, my mum asked (well…told) me that she wanted me to do a reading, of anything I wanted, a poem, a piece of writing, anything that I thought appropriate. This plan fell flat around the middle of the year, with my mum claiming she didn’t want to be the centre of attention, she had her day twenty five years ago; now they plan to have a dinner with friends and family. I decided to write them this anyhow, even if they never get to hear it.