paper tigers straddle
these doorways of perception
while we grow sleep in
those rusted mortal chains
bound by future desires
they block the tirade of jobcentre queues
                                                   gentle
                                               on the breeze
where chapters bind us (lost words)
roar to the core         animal entrapment
they hear you calling     from far away
& freeze in the moment




2/
dissemination murals
crack of dawn shadings
turning off capitalism’s filth
jaws/darkness/hunches towards
failing light
along a promenade at midnight
                                fools’ gold folds into sea
                                entry into schools/teachers decapitated 

from knowledge
fishmongers gone ashore cruelly joke
recording debits from credit card union
debasement’s brass etchings

3/
judges in plaster-cast moons
resulting hybrid benefactors
tracing etchings’
steps of wounded soldiers/
their pleas fall on/deaf ears

rattling drums/rattle snakes
(all)

encircled by bankers’ crumbs
bestowing on the headland
breaking wave gestures
tide’s fortitude

4/
fading light surrounds womb
             plastic cups social discourse
returning by memory’s see-saw swing
democracy’s wild call – a note from the press
motions
to sea-sick sailors (come)
audio then visual deprivations
outside those freezing chessboard nations

men in uniforms
split their sides
castigating new verbs

5/
desperately seeking fortunes
idle chatter frays on mudflaps
the gin-soaked body of wasted away
(passing their sealed lips)

stacked crazy artisans
rest a while this balance

in rear-view mirrors
at the factory’s birth
akin to 1960’s wallflowers

dishing the dirt on helpless presidents
context of the beat
conflict of defeat
bearing witness to eggshell crossroads


6/
dramatic intrigue as
shoelaces recapture
stepping gundogs which
sniff the air
(walking)
charitable cops
disregarding replica prime ministers
fooled into lapsing to
another doggy language
howling in this aftermath
where days emblazon
new colours for old spring collections
daffodils worn in the emptiness
as unemployment discolours
  

7/
junk heart stakes out
gentle malnutrition
seedlings posing perpendicular prosedy
across choppy sea disasters
as gesticulating bureaucrats
wander deserts & gypsy
hymns decline
racial origin
forceful adjectives
hasten to kaleidoscopic horizons
traces on the shoreline
passing scoundrels declare
gaping wounds of love
then whisked off by
amateur chauffeurs
each with splendid haircuts
from 1958 movies
& delicate bone structures
carve intimate knowledge
across these cracks of desire

Clive Gresswell is a 65-year-old innovative writer and poet with many publications to his name. His sixth poetry book, a 16,000-word stream-of-consciousness prose poem Shadow Reel, will be available through Amazon in July.