Morning Rituals

At the burning of the toast
I prepare the spread
Bertoli's or Utterly Butterly
The sacrificial jam:
Mrs Darlington's
A nice new loaf of tiger white
Twice around the toaster
And then we bite

Trees

St Anne's Square on Saturday

Trees/ View from Busstop

When Will He Who Hath Taken Away The Sins Of The World Be Famous

Jesus was an 80's kid
He liked Bros
Died on the cross
Tore his jeans
For our sins
Son of God
Saw them on Top of the Pops
When he'd done his miracles
He'd take his Disciples down to the disco
John the Baptist
Loved his Kraftwerk
And Mary Magdelene
Played the synth

I Must Confess

I must confess
That on a number of occasions
I have used words without fully understanding their meaning
I have from time to time been known to refer to the dictionary
Or sometimes I just stick them in
Because I think they look pretty
So please don't feel cheated
If I say that every line in this poem has been superheated
When blowing up a balloon, 
The hardest part is getting it started
It turns out that the excess pressure due to surface tension 
Is inversely proportional to the diameter of the bubble


And you know
I'll do anything for a rhyme

Page Watching

I've been page watching
For the past few weeks
Mostly during my lunchbreak
Or when I'm on the bus


Some people call it reading
But I think they're missing the point
I don't just look at the words
I look at the spaces and the numbers too


I find second-hand books the most rewarding
You can trace the signs of age
The imprint of ownership
In every crease and every fold


I know what you're going to say
Why not just stare at a blank page
If you're not interested in the characters or the plot
Then why bother to even look


But for me it's not about what's there
But what's not
And after an afternoon of page watching
I might go and read a book