Injure Eternity

Sometimes it’s just a matter of time
The time to take the time
To embrace the time
Having time enough that time is well spent

It’s a currency you can never have too much of
Or, if you think you have, then remember that
On your last day, with your last breath
A thin smile creases your ripped lips
As you think
How lucky I was, how blessed
And how great a fool

To think I could have had too much
Of a good thing
The greatest thing
And a far wiser man than me once said
When he was wandering the woods
And playing in trees
As if you could kill time without injuring eternity

On that one thing
And many more I’m sure
He couldn’t have been more right
Now and then we all have the time to write
To right the wrongs of words we never said
To say out loud the mantra that is crashing through our
Heads

But when few enough hear it and fewer still
Care, it becomes harder and tougher and well,
Leads to despair

So forgive me when these jaded green eyes
Impassive, pass right through you
I’ve seen far more than I care to see of apathy
And far too little of life to have a valid opinion
Not every poem can be a battle hymn
Not every verse can shake you
And this line is no elegy
Just promise that you’ll find time for me
And I’ll take the time to keep scribbling along

Spurting verses that sound better in one’s head
That on the pages that nobody has read
If rhyme doesn’t sound wrong then look for
No reason more
Than surface meaning not surfeit layers
Nor anything buried deeper
Than the skin
I’m just here to scratch itches not open up wounds

I’ve taken alliteration as far as I can
And wordplay innovations no longer hold you in ovation
I’ve shown all that I can give
And given far less than I should
Though it’s more than most care to hear

Flavour

It’s funny how things work out
She offered as her lips delicately traced
The long edge of the thin paper
And soft fingers rolled it expertly into a small stick

Chapped lips and yellowed teeth
Teasing, tasting the words more than the nicotine
Watchful eyes wandering across my care – etched
Face, faltering as I stuttered and stammered what

Little I could, blinking blindly into the sunrise with my
Legs dangling limply over the seawall
Struggling to process
She noticed the blink

It’s kinda bright here, dontcha think
Should we walk or stay sat here
Politeness, a kindness
Sincere, no veneer
But it mattered not

Who is it, what is it
There’s no-one, it’s nothing
But that’s kinda the point
We both knew there was a shelf life
To love life, an expiry to the perspiring
The sweat drenched wild nights

When they’ve come and gone
And seen their best days fade
Frankly, it’s, well not a drag
She took a drag of the fag
Breathed in, drew down
But time waits for no-one
Not us

And what have we got
Some laughter, some banter
And that’s just our lot
It’s not you or me
It’s us
This
Right here
Just doesn’t do either of us any favours
When neither is each other’s
Flavour of the month

She turned to me
With eyes black as jet
Soft lips formed a final word
Cigarette?

Be All; End All release notes

Beautiful cover art by Violet Adams.

Released this month; my second book. Be All; End All is a collection of poems and it will be available from selected Suffolk book shops, myself personally or through Paypal ordering. Be All; End All has been written since the release of Swannui and Cygnus in the summer of last year. It is considerably longer, deeper and perhaps less conventional than my earlier work; often Swannui and Cygnus poems bore the mark of the eager university student seeking his tutor’s approval. I shall release it for myself if for no-one else.

Swannui and Cygnus (for sale in bookshops in Beccles) featured 23 poems, a compendium spanning several years. There were poems which I had written aged 16, sat in class in sixth form, procrastinating in an English lesson. There were poems I had written just weeks or even days before (Meander was written as I was formatting the PDF). A 9 year selection of poetry can show an evolution but also can seem muddied and inconsistent. That said, I am still proud of my first book.

Each book is £4, one copy of each can be bought together for £6.

Immaculate

We’ve all been searching for something for so long
That the reality is that we simply can’t accept anything
That’s real, as everything that is actual and material
Is by its nature, flawed with faults and far from

The ideal, the perfect, the immaculate image of
That life we dreamt of
That we were raised on, hand reared to believe
That something just a little beyond human

Existence could await us, perhaps only us
And it’s all fairy tales and folk lore
But perhaps thats all there is
There are no dragons, no hydras, no trolls

No knights, no princess
Nobody wears a white veil
We are all muddied, bloodied
Human and defective

Beauty is best left fleeting
Because she is a flickering, fluttering flash
Through your life
A bright flame that burns out far too fast

And scorches into the soul
The first cut is the deepest is
A lie I’ve heard far too many times
As the twentieth gouge slices roughly into

My aching wrist, relax and wrap it up
A tourniquet, a suture sculpting the skin
To disguise the damage of
Every little last laceration

Thanks for the mammaries, the misery, the memories
The mild amusement and the smile that slips across
These bruised and battered features
It’s not so bad, we are all alive and

Well, well isn’t that just the point
We live, we grow, we move on
And beautiful moments are only beautiful
As they are so short, sharp, sudden
Unexpected and altogether surprising
Cutting us to our cynical cores and showing
A glistening glimpse of something that we know
Deep down is the ecstasy of life

All good things in small doses
Lap it up and indulge
Savour it, savour her
Save up the saviour and store it
To save you from your sorrow

Meander

Meander
Perhaps it’s time to stop living up there and
Time to start living down here
In the sweat, in the grind
With narrow thoughts, constrained brains

Looking at the smaller picture, or no picture at all
A blank canvas and a concrete wall
Grey plaster, dull brick, utilitarian
Built just to hold up the roof

To box you in and shut out the sky
The light, the air
Everything that’s outside that reminds you
That stirs in you that final hope

That quietened voice, whispering gently
Salacious rumours of another world,
Another way
Shut it out, take the pill

My mind meanders, traipses
Skitters, skips and dances
Through fields and valleys
Flys away at the first stirring of boredom

So brick us in, dig it deep
Throw on the dirt and tighten the shackles
Polish that suit, buff those shoes
It doesn’t pay to think and pay is the way of the world

Swannui and Cygnus on Kindle for 77p

Just a quick update to say that

is now available on Kindle for just 77p.
Here:
http://amzn.to/13Ju9ll

File kindly converted by my good friend Paul Gillings

Swannui and Cygnus

My first book

Debut Poetry Book for Beccles writer

Daniel Brunsdon has been writing poems and short stories for over 10 years. The former Sir John Leman High School student and Loughborough University graduate is excited to be releasing his debut poetry compilation. Entitled “Swannui and Cygnus” (a play on ennui and sickness), the collection of poems is now on sale.
The poems cover such diverse themes as world-weariness, misanthropy, disillusionment, apathy, world-weariness, war and religion. Although hardly lighthearted, Swannui and Cygnus balances this with a cautious optimism and a playful nod to the writer’s idols.
Daniel, a Beccles native, said “Swannui and Cygnus is austerity made poetry, poems for those of us who have taken our first steps into adulthood under the cloud of a recession.”
Swannui and Cygnus is available to buy in Beccles from Besleys Books and Beccles Books and online at http://www.iridescentfox.bigcartel.com

For more information please visit his website http://www.iridescentfox.co.uk

Wash Away The Stains

I don’t know your name but you

Have changed more than

I ever knew possible when I

First saw you standing there I never

Thought you could touch me in

Such a way, stranger, don’t speak

And kill this, don’t even move those

Lips

 

And i’m shaking in my soul, but you

Are still, cold and numb, and this is

Just how I love you, why I care

Because knowing nothing about you is

Why you stay perfect

 

You stand still with a light in your

Hand, stock still silent and holy

Stranger. The crowd in black rolls past

Won’t you hold me tighter.

I catch your eye and look away

Timeless, you are, just another

Example of life