''I started writing these little things about 10 years ago, back when I read the war poets at high school. Together with William Blake they really turned my mind on to poetry. I was a bit of a rebel at the time and believe it or not, getting into poetry was quite rebellious where I came from! These days I’m a bit more relaxed about it and aside from little things I feel compelled to write at time of occurrence, my writing seems to fall into a few different groups.
There’s things I write on the wonder of the natural world – perhaps in a way some folks don’t see quite it, more like the way I believe it to be. Things like Woodlands' Edge and Old Forest. Then there's historical stuff like English Corn, my slightly more abstract words like A Scene From The Dream of Bean and Seams of Time and then there's a lot of more personal stuff that I don’t really share with people. My favorite at the moment I guess is The Boy With Wings. I like the idea of creating these strange little tales of folk lore. It's something I’m looking to do a lot more in my songs too. ''
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'Old Forest'
Old forest of green
Your wild colours gleam
Their fashion the oldest of arts
Dress all that know you in coats of your leaves
Send out your creatures, your moths and your bees
And give song to all that come hear you
Old forest in bloom
Your wild weavers loom
Pictures of lore and belief
See all that see you know truth in the their dreams
Send out your creatures both morning and eve
And grant your cool meadows for sleeping
Old forest of red
Make your autumnal bed
In splashes of gold, green and brown
Gift all that walk there with sight of the old days
Send out your creatures your worms and your snails
And give scent to all who come seek you
Old forest of white
Illume in the night
With your fingers that grasp at the moon
Grant all that seek you their magic and math
Send out your creatures, your owls and your bats
And bring spring to the oldest that reach you
'English Corn'
Golden fields of English corn
In earth from which great days were sworn
Between the bows of green and brown
As roses fell for England’s crown
All along the ridge above
The golden fields were toiled with love
And witness to the changing moon
That shine on soil about the tombs
As farmers turn the earth anew
And in their plough, turn the few
Still set amongst the seasons rain
Unmarked by time or stone or name
From country streams all washed with red
To country lanes of littered dead
Walk on by in summer’s hue
With unheard feet that walk with you
For there are some who still remember
Those that once stood in armour
In fields from which great tales were born
Amongst the golden English corn
'Silver'
Today the world is silver
With no time to be keeping
Beneath the earthen carpet
That rolls its gold’s above the sleeping
The birds and all their prey
Are sleeping in today
Soundly in their country homes
With dreams of early May
Today the world is silver
With no need of rushing
Steel grey sky on a frozen lake
On which all thoughts are skating
The scent of dampened logs
The sight of happy dogs
They chase their tails in winter woods
Just as they did in summer
Today the world is silver
With no time to be keeping
As we tread with careful feet
Above a world still sleeping
'A Scene from the Dream of Bean'
There’s a prophet on the rooftop
Screaming at the sky
A poet in the bookshop
Looking up the lie
A beggar in the gin shop, water welling in his eyes
I watched them from your window in my dream
In the middle of the market square
There stood a lady thief
Selling flowers from the graveyard
That she tries to trade on grief
As the mourners leave for parties in the country
I watched them from your window in my dream
‘There is shelter in the sewers’
Ten feet letters on the wall
‘But mind your time in service
There is not shelter for you all
Only those who paid in full shall be spared the spectres’ call’
I read them from your window in my dreaming
Then came a man in armour
A sword drawn at his side
Shouting from his saddle
‘All you dreamers back inside!
Peace be in the city and do not recall the day you died!’
I listened from your window in my dream
The morning broke in earnest
The clock tower in the sun
The beggar drunk, the prophet climbed
And the bookshop doorbell rung
And still the lady stood their selling flowers
I smelt them from your window in my dream
'Seams of Time'
Time can come loose at the seams
And where it does you can sneak in your dreams
And try mapping a route
So you’ll not need directions again
You can skip through a passage in time
Go where your third eye is no longer blind
Through the hole in the garden you saw once before
When you were small
Go chase through the alleys again
Run on the heels of a free forming rhyme
That can act as a password
To unlock of the love that you saw
Look in on friends of the glass
Sat around tables, dealing in ash
Attempt a persuasion
But do not take to heart their rebuke
Love is a wheel stopped in water
Me and you both are just moss on its spokes
It will let us ride easy
Until it needs hit water again
And life is a line in the sand
The trick is to hold off the tide with one hand
And keep your other one plotting the courses
To sail should you fail
So spin out my heart on your loom
Let me be the cotton as you weave round the moon
And keep stitching those holes
In the tattered & snagged seams of time
Then remember your way back to bed
Through the wild splattered colours of the sky in your head
To wake in the morning
And think it was all a dream
'Dream Museum'
Hallways lined with picture frames
Filled with people you don’t know
Still, you’re sad all the same
To see them growing old
You walk on down the corridor
To a ballroom filled with light
You search the room for those you’ve known
And those you hoped you might
On a stage the thespians act out scenes
Moments from your life
And while the whole room applauds
You're sleeping in the aisle
You wake and wonder on
But your chance to leave is gone
There’s a wheel on the table
Its turning
And all games are on
Women dressed in wedding gowns
From the backrooms of your mind
Have found ways to present themselves
In the gardens just outside
You chase them through a labyrinth
Until the mansion falls from view
Then you see they are not there at all
And you're lonely in the gloom
You think of ways to wake yourself
But you don’t know how you came
Everything is older now
As you lose your way again
Still you wonder on
Your chance to leave long gone
The wheel on the table is burning
And you’re climbing on
'Ode to Penmon Priory'
The raiders came sailing to Penmon
To gather its spoils to the sea
To cast out the Prior and burn down his church
And leave only ashes for me
But with holy remembrance of Seiriol
Came builders who toiled in the rain
To raise walls made of stone to give the pilgrims a home
In whichever season they came
And so set by ocean and mountain
On the isle with most holy of pasts
The Priory still stands by the pebble lined sands
As it has for some nine hundred years passed
'The Boy with Wings'
The day that the winged boy had fallen
Nobody believed it was true
For as long as remembered the people had watched
That bird of a boy as he flew
Sweeping down over their rooftops
Turning tricks with his velveteen wings
He’d bask in delight at their hearty applause
Then retreat to the mist covered hills
It was the vicar that came over his body
He declared it the good will of god
To see his wings bent, broken and torn
He was sure gods work had been done
He had said that the boy was a demon
A ‘winged beast of hell from the sky’
But the villagers knew the strange boy that flew
Was a creature much like you and I
And so all the village remembered
The ones who been winged in the past
The ones that had flown and had granted their dreams
With a magic thought long ago passed
So they took all their candles and torches
And carried the boy to his cave
And with tears in their eyes and love in their hearts
They set him down into his grave
They threw in things that he’d gather
Berries, branches & cones
And with thanks for the wonders he’d given
They filled in the grave with fine stones
The vicar saw nothing next morning
And feared that the boy flew away
That he had returned to his crude mountain lair
And would soon come to whisk him away
Then one night the vicar did vanish
Taken at night to the cave
And although all the village knew where he’d gone
None spoke a word of the grave
So the lords men swept into the village
Noting places, descriptions and times
But no matter what questions they asked in their quest
None met with answer in kind
And it is said a winged spirit still wanders
With splendour and grace through the air
He goes to the village to be seen by his friends
Who leave pine cones and treats for him there
And all of their dreams go on granted
In awe of the joy that he brings
And all of the village remembers in song
The boy in the cave and his wings
‘Woodlands’ Edge'
I have seen the faces in the wood
Watching from the gnarled bark
Sunken in the mud
Giving eyes to memory of earths most ancient blood
I have seen the faces in the wood
I have heard the whispers on the breeze
Half remembered places
In the hollows of the trees
Doorways to forgotten things that some of us still see
I have heard the whispers on the breeze
And I have seen the lanterns in the grass
Lighting up the night
To mark our journeys past
Guiding all who see them onto a different path
I have seen their lanterns in the grass
