AUSTIN HERPES

Austin Herpes
Was
A fly by night pig
A glad
Gay
Hey…
What’s it matter
Gad about town pig
Just as long as someone else was paying
He’d be staying
In their company
Austin Herpes was the long in cool
Skinny and mean
But every inch a pig
He was the street in ‘Cred’
Snort snort
snuffle
Bombed on ‘Charlie’
Had nose for it
Had a rosé for it
'Laurent Perrier'
I’ll be bound
Another sucker’s round
Hubble
Bubble
That’s the trouble
With fizzy
Busy Pigs
Little friends
Squealing their shallow delight
On gala night
Never there
When you want them
Never there
When I want to dance
What’ya mean romance?
Haven’t you heard
Anything I’ve been saying
He’s always with others
If they’re paying
Oh yes
Austin Herpes will be staying
All right
Playing
All night
Making a pig of himself

Don't know why ...

There's no sun up in the sky ...

Just green tomatoes...

Is a man ever too old too wear pink underwear....I think not

However there are somethings that
men of a certain age do that really pisses me off...









Men Of A Certain Age

I hate brown leather blousons
And faded blue jeans that cry out for an arse
Tired white trainers
Way past their best
And baseball caps
Dull gold earrings and large sovereign rings
Black dirty fingernails
Bitten to the quick
And football shirts worn on Mondays
That hang limp as charity shop flags
And gaps between yellow teeth
Black spaces filled by repetition
That leach banality and quiet obscenities.

DVD and Sky TV
Blockbuster video boys
Costa fortune on the yearly Spain plane
Undressed to kill in the sun
Sangria and skittles
Chips off the block
Old enough to know better
Than their middle age children
They dance the night away
In a red sweat haze
Until the morning smeared mirror
Screams out its honesty
To red blind eyes and flaccid obesity dreaming

Jack came Dancing

A hundred or so,
Years ago,
Dark came chancing with a ripper's knife,
Came he dancing taking life,
Deaftly in that midnight hour.
Came the stripping,
Then the ripping,
Then just as lightly he was flitting,
Into the darkness after slitting,
Snow white breasts,
Plump pleasuring flesh.
Dr Death waits concealing,
A heart, a womb congealing,
Watching bloody, 'neth the hissing lamp
Streaming,
Steaming in the sulphurous light
Murdered,
Screaming, in the dead of night.

Windrush

A long tail wind was rushing tin brush zoom and dust, that I’m not going any where fast rush, a rush that streaks and blurs. Moments later Stood as still as crows teeth but still shaking with that ‘wanna go', trembling like new summer, stayin' ready at the first breath of go.

The town was tinsel brushed and pretty, she slippery as silk whispered through gypsy red upon my mouth her petal sweet lips, a pearl carried on her breath.

‘Take me dancing ’danciing dancing…dancing’ and lets fly away.
Oh yes, please, and double sweet, go right back and buy me a pair of blood red shoes.
.
First stop is always ‘Paradise’ stardust powder, sweet smellin’ air, fine as France, all to the tune of down there where the green grass grows… in rows.

Tearin’ my heart out, steppin’ out from ‘Paradise'. It’s like bowling bottles down a quiet street, Paradise' … it’s so warm and touchy feel down here in the wet warm brush me down of where I need to be… and it’s so cold outside.

Later talk…

By and by with moon shine crawlln’, I'm callin’ at the ‘Lazy Jo’. don’t you know, Yeah the 'Lazy Jo' where there’s truth in a glass as they're pourin' dreams from a bottle.
Hangin' on nail is a bar room towel to wipe away the tears.

Jennifer

The first girl in my life was called Jennifer
She had auburn hair and spots
She wrote me searing letters
And loved me lots and lots
We would walk through the tangle down
And passed the rushy pool
Holding hands on Sundays
And each Wednesday after school
To bore you with the others in my life
Would spoil the love that’s past
No one sends me letters now
Adoration fails fast
Ahh, to walk through the tangle down
And past the rushy pool
Where we held hands on Sundays
And each Wednesday after school
When all of my life’s years have kissed me
And in a flower garden I’m laid to rest
Dreaming of that fiery maid
The one I loved the best
Again we’ll walk through tangle down
Then past the rushy pool
Holding hands on Sundays
And each Wednesday after school

The Cowboysuit

Christmas 1952
Cowes
Isle Of Wight England

After the sumptuous Christmas lunch the old Uncles returned to the 'Front' room and whilst I played quietly they dozed in front of the cheery little coal fire. The ladies took up their respective positions in the small scullery to begin the task of washing up and preparing the high tea which would be provided before 5' o clock .

My Uncles snuffled from their dozing and rose up out of their chairs checked their gold pocket watches, then a little unsteadily followed each other through the doorway. Their polished black boots squeaking loudly upon the long polished hallway passage floor as they made their way puffing and wheezing to the 'Back' room where the radio crackled the trumpeting strains of the National Anthem.

As the Queen's speech droned I was left alone in the 'Front' room to delight in dressing up, magic layer on magic layer as a cowboy. Finally, the cold silver shining star was buffed and the leather cartridge belt was clipped into place its swinging holsters heavy with six shooters. The transformation from boy to Texas Ranger was complete. For the next hour I shot baddies and rode the prairies and was wounded and killed by many a Redskin's arrow causing me to tumble dramatically from my horse and lie writhing on the sofa, only to miraculously burst into life and kill at least a dozen men midst a burst of gunshots and acrid caps smoke.

My faithful horse was the plump, wide velveteen arm of the sofa, the fat soft cushions served as rocks of the red desert over which I galloped. Wincing with pain and with the zip of bullets whining all about me I made it to my bedroom returning with no more than a flesh wound and my dressing gown cord. The next ten minutes were fraught, although most of the baddies lay where my bullets had dropped them I was unable to deal with the dozen or so that were left and had, although not without a fight, been captured and was to be shot or hanged at day break if I didn't tell them where the gold was hidden. As was customary, to stop me escaping, I was tied tightly, to accomplish this I tied my own feet together tightly with the dressing gown cord and then placing my hands behind my back I wound the neck kerchief tightly around my wrist and fingers. Tied tightly by the bandits I slumped across my trusty horse only to be pushed helplessly from my horse down into the dust of Main Street.

Suddenly, as I was about to make my escape, which would have resulted in a visit to Boot Hill for my captors, I was interrupted by Aunt Min's insistent voice calling me from the 'Back' room for tea. My first attempt to roll off the sofa resulted in my colliding with a small table in front of the fire causing me considerable pain my second was even more painful as I rolled past the table this time striking my head against the corner of the brass fender which bordered the hearth.

My Aunt's voice was growing increasingly urgent, I began hopping, even though I was tied hand and foot, down the polished passageway making my escape from the Jesse Jame's gang as I leapt toward the yellow light of the 'Back' room. Just one more leap and I would make it, and what an entry I would make, what an amusing episode for all of my family as they sat patiently around the tea table.

There were not many mats in my Grandmother's house but there was one laid outside of the 'Back' room door, just a small one made from rag clippings.
For the briefest of moments I was aware of eager faces lit by the soft light as my family waited at table. I stole a fleeting glance of trifles and large coloured jellies even gleaned the briefest whiff of hot mince pies as I glided passed the open doorway of the 'Back' room. The gleaming polished floor was to be my downfall in more ways than one, somewhere in the distance I heard the Jesse James gang whooping and firing six shooters in the air. The small mat had shot away from under my feet and was flying behind me, as I, tied hand and foot, pitched forward toward the small scullery.

The gang mounted and had circled to look down at me, Jesse broke ranks and trotted forward leaning down he drawled 'That this town wasn't big enough for the both of us'. I watched as lazy fingers twitched and danced over his holstered guns as a lash of wind blew scrambling sage bush down Main street and in that same moment my head was filled by a loud cracking and a shower of dazzling lights and then total oblivion.

A little reminiscence of my boyhood

SANDOWN Isle of Wight 1953

It was a usual Saturday the sun had come early turned to rain and returned bright and shining by the evening. Mid summer extending the long bright evenings into a sultry nights and on one particular Saturday my father had promised that if we were up early enough the next morning we could catch the bus to Sandown and spend the day on the golden beaches beside the sea.

The resort town of Sandown lying in the southern lee of Culver Cliff is no more than fifteen miles from East Cowes but to me it was an unbelievable distance and I had the same feeling then as I do now when I venture to the Mediterranean.

I prayed for the sun to keep shining and was happy that the voices agreed that the day would be a family day. I began dab dab dabbing to appease the voices in order that the day would be bright and sunny and that my parents wouldn't row before the morning.

Mother had wrapped thick ragged sandwiches filled with egg that smelt like burnt matches into yards of greaseproof paper in readiness, before they had gone out for the evening. Although they had promised to return home early from the Victoria Tavern the midnight rattles at the front door and tearful entrance held little hope of a forthcoming day at Sandown and had accepted the likelihood that this Sunday I would be filling sacks of shingle for my Grandfather as usual.

I hated Sundays!

Bright sunlight rippled through the thin curtain in my bedroom and good humour moved about the small flat, I could them both laughing.

The voices had relented!

This Sunday was going to be different.
I was awoken at six, washed, feed and sent outside to await my parents. They soon appeared spreading confusion and panic before them like confetti my father swinging a brown paper carrier bag by its string handles whilst my mother carried a large gondola shaped wicker basket full of rolled towels over her arm.

As expected the single decker green 'Vectis' bus was almost full but nonetheless we clambered aboard with no alternative but to stand for the whole journey. The single decker bus chugged past winding hedges and then once over Arreton Downs took us spiralling down into Sandown.

The first impression of Sandown was the noise the hustle bustle of Homes Counties. Children lots of children with strange accents, I particularly recall the way they pronounced water as wolt- ahh as their skinny pale arms hung each side of orange rubber rings around their pale bodies. An intoxicating sickly sweetness hung in the air from the high street where we had alighted from the bus to the beach, rock sticks and ices and candy floss but disappeared as you rounded the corner and descended to the beach. Salty and clean, the sea seemed distant and shimmering, the hot sand sank about you whilst hopping in circles removing shoes which were then carried tied by their laces around your neck. Happy suntanned men wearing shorts and faded marine caps reeled off coloured tickets for the hire of deckchairs, windbreaks and the hire of pedaloes.

A position furthest most from the sea under the promenade wall was sought as my mother stood with her basket and the carrier bag held high to her chest whilst my father struggled cursing with the deckchairs and windbreak.

With exception of swimwear there was very little custom made beachwear in evidence men and woman were dressed in exactly the same way as they might for a picnic or an afternoon’s shopping. At best jackets were removed shirts necks unbuttoned and opened heavy trousers with their turn ups full of sand were rolled up,
bunions and corns crawled beneath the warm sand as exposed legs, whiter than candles quickly turned pink.

Children were always sans deckchair and were expected to take up a sitting position in the burning gritty sand at best upon a reed mat or towel. Meanwhile a hundred children like me were stripping under less than inadequate towels into woollen swimwear and then released scuttling over the hot sand like turtles towards the crashing and sucking foam. Rows of screaming children timorously inched into the icy water their shaking hands cupped beneath shivering chins whilst others already in the chilly brine took great delight in splashing and ducking their younger siblings.

The ritual was as unpleasant and intrusive as the first day at school and although I was an Islander I moved among them like a clumsy stranger stark and awkward. I ducked into the water and swam over arm splashing out furiously not stopping until the salty burn of seawater grasping and beating in my chest stopped me making another stroke.. The water beneath me grew deeper it was stinging as my hands chilled and aching pushed in circles. Treading water I looked back at the full expanse of the beach which was jammed line after line with people I could hear the shrill cries of excited children clearly but had no way of seeing my parents who were fighting sand and sandwich over a breeze blown News of the World beneath the grey concrete of the promenade wall.