Little by little,
it, for it
deserves no other name,
eats away at me, stripping bare
my resolve and my will,
my own mind, my thoughts
of which I knew I was right
even when others treated me like dirt,
my apologies, sincere, full of self loathing
because I had hurt someone…
little by little it is being sapped away
and in it, I hate.
I hate what it is doing to my body,
I hate the small changes
the blood appearing in my piss,
A train of Jackdaws
hopped on stiletto claw on board
the fifteen forty out of Wolverhampton,
bob tails waggling, beaks opening with wild
inquisitive shrills,
their voices
displaying nothing but the search for worms
in the dirt, the mud a step too far
for the preening old birds
with florescent feathers,
the odd battle scar where the edges were ripped
as they tussled and tore at life…
Finding water
unpalatable, the inexhaustible selfie
drags itself once more into existence
and the high pitched squeal of bird like delight
A stomach growl, felt the stab
of indiscriminate pain
that has wandered my body
all of my life, and it froze
causing me terror at
one thirty A.M. no addiction.
Turning on the radio to wipe
away the sweet sweat, I hear that you had died
and grief, just as painful
washed over me,
I was blessed to have existed
when you had lived,
I wouldn’t change that for the world.
Ian D. Hall 2017
A fence is a wall by any other name,
keep
them out, sign their names,
put them in one place,
in a home, make everybody scared
to show their compassion, ridicule them when they do
and when someone speaks up,
when the tiny voice of reason
finds that they can stand it no more,
take them out also and shoot them
against a bullet riddled wall.
Makes no difference to me
what religion you are,
just because I do not believe what you believe
Today
we mourn the loss
of our dear
friend.
Although he was unashamedly odd,
89
was a trooper,
and whilst
many of us only knew him in late life,
I just wish
you could have known him
in his prime.
Ian D. Hall 2017
I am an altered fact,
so are you,
we only exist in a state of comfortable
despair because the very rich,
the very stupid
and the unfathomably popular
allow us to be there to be struck off,
one by one, in a crowd, sniper guns
pounding coins
whilst they hoard pounds,
guarding the brain cells that give them power
but dementia like poise and dying cells
they release the ones that guide
compassion, hope and love
and they somehow infect us with promises
I feel old,
especially in the dark hours
when once I could go all night
talking to you, dreaming
of a time when my life was more
than just a scribble in a notepad.
My wife
sometimes says, with a smile
of course,
that I am a child,
in that case I cannot
wait
to have my mid life crisis
at 89.
Ian D. Hall 2017
I miss her Nordic smile,
there was beauty
in that one defining movement,
a sweeping subtle gesture
of cool, of passion, of love
that was only betrayed by her eyes,
if they gleamed when spoke
it was as if the North Sea
had been tamed and your soul
could float between England,
Norway, Denmark and the Faroes,
adrift in that smile for eternity.
Ian D. Hall 2017
I know you are alive,
last night in my dreams
I kissed you
sweetly on the lips, red rose,
your breathing silent but
your chest
Accordion like and sad lament
playing; I know
that you are alive
for I rarely
dream of the dead.
Ian D. Hall 2017
The cake sputtered cough
is hidden by the hand of polite demure,
debutantes in waiting, in another age,
stylish but now the crumbs filter down
and she eyes another slice of thinly
scrapped bread and only manages a smile,
secretive, she never let her lips show it,
when she bit into the egg and cress on white.
Her fingers gently touches the lip of her friend,
making a show of the mess a cucumber will make
and the table laughs it off, but inwardly
she draws deep excited breaths, the closest