Black Bess - Mess

I have a Royal Enfield, I call her Black Bess
She’s getting old and her wirings a mess
She has become a large part of my life
But this comment I always get from my wife
“I think that you love her much more than me”
When I explained she just could not see
That I love you both in equal measure
For you both give me so much pleasure
And in some ways you and my bike
Are so similar, so very much alike
It is here I must have had a mental block
For I expounded, mentioning the miles on the clock
And that in the mornings she needed a few kicks
Words like “temperamental” “stubborn” I added to the mix
And like her colour, your moods can be black
In these periods you’re both prone to kickback
By this time my wife was getting overheated
“Familiar” I thought as I slowly retreated
All this, on my part was a mistake I guess
Because my wife blew a gasket and so did Black Bess

© Ray Gorringe 2010

I’m no hypochondriac, but how can I sleep at night
When the worry of catching insomnia gives me a fright

Computer Dating

I met an old friend the other week
Still single, always the Geek
Thick rimmed glasses and an Elvis quiff
A little too proper and decidedly stiff

He said that he has trouble getting a date
Thought perhaps it was getting too late
He said Ray “what can I do?”
I want to be married and happy like you

I said Dave you’re the computer guru
Try computer dating that’s what you do
You could meet the girl you desire
Better do it now before you retire

So that night he made some Bournvita
Logged on and Googled, hoping he’d meet her
He found a site that could work out fine
“Mega Bit Dating Agency” here for you, all the time

He signed up and paid with his plastic
Fifty dollars was a little drastic
But what the hell, if it works for me
I’ll give it a try we’ll see what we see

He had the obligatory form to fill in
Age, occupation, earnings that sort of thing
There were quite a few questions like these
But when it came to sex he answered yes please

Now I must help you and shorten this tale
This site worked and he contacted a Gal
They arrange a time and a place to meet
A cyber cafe just down the street

He arrived with plenty of time to spare
And was quickly ushered to a waiting chair
In front of a computer, he turned it on
Thinking what’s going down here is this a con

He stared intently at the monitor
Welcome to “Mega Bit” my name is Monica
And I will be your date for tonight
It wasn’t so bad after the initial fright

I met him again the very next day
He shook my hand saying thank you Ray
I was confused asking how was your night?
“It was good, in fact it was a delight”

She had a mainframe to die for
She even had a modern duel core
Said she would like a little more Ram
Showed me what she could do with her inbuilt web cam

In her memory there’s so much to be explored
Next date she’ll introduce me to her Motherboard
I truly can not wait till next week
“Oh well! Once a Geek always a Geek”

© Ray Gorringe 2010

Breadline Blues

Poor people privately pleading
Often openly obscured outcasts
Visually valueless vagrancy victims
Earnestly economically eking earnings
Restlessly resisting raising resentment
Tirelessly trying to thrive
Yesterdays yield yesteryears yells

Just a Purrfect Day

There in a puddle left by the rain
A bird washing, taking such pain
Wet and bedraggled far worse than before
Too heavy with water to leave the floor
A cat on a wall a distance away
A lean and dirty local stray
Sees this bird and realises its plight
Knows that it’s incapable of flight
In his hungry head he sees his chance
And without as much as a second glance
Pounces from his wall with intent
An opportunity like this is heaven sent
This bird still unable to fly
Sees the cat in the corner of his eye
He screams and franticly flaps his wings around
This catches the attention of a nearby hound
The dog thought, a cat verses a bird well that’s not fare
I know, I’ll give this cat a really bad scare
So the dog drew a deep deep breath
Barked like hell, and scared the cat to death
The cat wisely ran a mile
The dog gave a satisfied smile
Now the bird had dried, he was able to fly
He swooped down to his saviour from his perch on high
He landed on the dogs back without any fear
Climbed on his head and uttered these word into his ear
Thank you kind hound, I owe my life to you
Tell me please is there anything for you I can do
“Don’t mention it” but seeing your asking, do you see that tick in my ear?
Without hesitation the bird got to work and pecked the whole dog clear
They became friends forever that day
Helping each other in every way
The dog clear of unwanted pests
And the bird had hair to line its nests
Now if like me you have regard for every living thing
Regardless of species, creed or colour of skin
You will have a concern for this cat abruptly separated from his meal
And you think that perhaps he was dealt a rotten deal
Do not worry as it appears it was indeed his lucky day
For in his hurry to escape he went a different way
He ran into a fisher lady sitting gutting fish
She took pity on this cat and filled for him a dish
Life goes on, sometimes in a strange way
But all in all for these four this was truly a purrfect day

A Prayer for Haiti

The cruelty of nature has once again shown its hand
As an earthquake has stuck an already troubled land
We must now forget their past atrocities
And bear no more animosities
We can not be the judge and jury
Can not compete with natures fury
Our hearts must go out to the survivors of this devastation
And we should offer a prayer for every single Haitian
For so many who have lost their lives, may their God accept their souls
And the kindness of others throughout the world fill the survivors bowls
May the power of their belief
Offer them some relief
May the outcome of this tragedy give them a better future
Heal the wounds of the past with a golden suture
Please give them the strength to rebuild their land
The strength of unity, with all hand in hand

Careing Sharing Pairing

He lays his head upon the pavement
Where he will spend his night
In his head he holds no resentment
He is tired from his existence fight

His sleep merely a restless slumber
On his hard and filthy bed
Just one of a vast number
But this is not in his head

First light, comes the bustle of activity
As sleep is wiped from his eyes
Yet another day in this uncompromising city
But he’s still grateful for the sunrise

He sifts through the garbage of the night
For a crust of bread, a few grains of rice
But he is still content, he knows that it’s right
To share this meagre breakfast with the multitude of mice

During the day he doesn’t wander far away
Accepting the occasional coin laid at his feet
Joined by a bedraggled dog, a poor mangy stray
His alms buys just enough for both of them to eat

This dog and he, together in their plight
He picks the fleas from the dogs dirty hair
The dog guards, keeping him safe at night
And supplying warmth from the cold night air

A lesson here for us to learn
From this unfortunate pairing
That life gives richness in return
For unconditional sharing

Is it easier to give, with half empty hand
Or with our hands half full
Will we ever learn, be able to understand
Let this thought remain and at our heartstrings pull

© Ray Gorringe 2010

MY CHRISTMAS WISHES

It is Christmas, a time when wishes can come true
I have wishes, and here are just a few
I wish for peace in every land
With every culture linked, hand in hand
I wish for the end of wars throughout the world
With the Rainbow flag of peace freely unfurled
I wish that Man could find a cure
For AIDS and Cancer that so many souls endure
I wish for a level playing field
Where the scars of disparity can be healed
I wish that terrorism becomes a thing of the past
No innocents suffering from indiscriminate bomb blast
I wish for an end to political corruption
Which waters the seed of moral destruction
I wish again that the world becomes one
With no battles of greed to be lost or won
Lastly I wish that at least one of my wishes comes true
And 2010 will be a better year for me and for you

Blind Faith (poem from story Son of a Farmer)

Still without children the farmer and wife
After many years of otherwise happy life
This a sorrow so hard to bear
Full of silent tearful despair

Every day when the farmer leaves for his field
His wife’s eyes with tears are filled
For from her window her eyes would dwell
Positioned there is the village well

Mothers fill their pitchers while their children play
There seated at the well like every other day
A young boy who was barely eight
Left by his Mother from dawn till late

This child, this poor wretched child
Sitting there so meek, and so mild
To his Mother he was just a bind
For he was totally profoundly blind

That night upon the farmers return
Wife said husband you know how we yearn
You know that child, that boy who is blind
We can adopt, I’m sure his mother won’t mind

But my wife my love he can not see
What good in our later life will he be
He has a heart husband of mine
He has a heart, let us be kind

Next morning he left for his field
Praying for a healthy, hearty yield
He left his wife with these words few
I love you wife, do what you have to do

Upon his return late at night
He was greeted by a wonderful sight
For there seated for him to see
He now had a completed family

This was a vision he’d held in his head
Ever since his wife and he had wed
A sight so wonderful to beguile
He showed his delight in his beaming smile

The first few years it was mother and son
The farmer said “to the field he must come”
He led his son then away
To the field for a working day

The farmer maybe long it the tooth
But he found this boy like many a youth
When it came to physical labour
He treated it with contempt and disfavour

So every day he sat on a boulder
While years past and he became older
Isolated, he was all alone
In some place, a world of his own

Then one morning the farmer woke late
A pain in his head and eyes that ache
Within just a matter of hours
He completely lost visual powers

The doctor said farmer my friend
For your sight this is the end
And the farmer he took to crying
He felt he would be better off dying

He started sitting at the well every day
For he could not think of any way
To keep his family feeding
While his heart was constantly bleeding

Then some weeks later
His son approached and said Pater
I don’t want your heart to bleed
Take my hand and I will lead

So on the trek they would start
As he had learnt the route by heart
And as this journey ended
The farmer realised his field had been well tended

From that day to the present
Through good times and the unpleasant
Farmer and son have worked hand in hand
Sowing and reaping their small piece of land

Now you must learn to know
With love and the seeds that you sow
You will most definitely find
That the blind can surely lead the blind

The Artist and His Muse

He is no longer an artist who has no name
His paintings adorn walls, he has his fame
Today he will commence his last and final piece
She is but a model, earning meagre fees
A young girl of beauty, just twenty years old
She is quickly posed upon a luxurious throw of gold

He, behind his easel, his canvas tightly stretched
He gazes on her face, where he sees her beauty etched
Palette in his left hand and brush in his right
Working out perspective in the ambient light
Pause a while, thinking, taking in the scene
Grateful that he had been sent such wonderful queen

Brush caressing the canvas like a gentle summer breeze
Depicting her contours with deft accomplished ease
Her deep brown hair of gleaming silken curls
Her eyes as wondrous as rarely seen black pearls
Her full lips with a warm honeysuckle smile
Her neck her shoulders, all wonders to beguile

He pauses once again, a required and thoughtful rest
Before he continues outlining her rounded alabaster breast
Her hourglass waist, her legs so elegantly slender
His brush, as if it also knew of this girls great splendour
Would glide and dance with magical unguided ease
As every contour, every curve it would lovingly tease

The time came and when his work was complete
He covered it with a pure white veil and took a seat
“Sir can I please see the fruits of your labour?”
Yes my dear, I hope that it meets with your favour
As she lifted the veil for the first expose
Her honeysuckle smile became an opening rose

But Sir have I not been your inspiration?
Is this a joke, or a cruel aberration
This canvas is blank, no oils have left your brush
Her cheeks already pink, but now a deep anger blush
Sir you will have to explain this to me
As there is nothing here for me to see

My dear sit down and I will tell you true
From the moment my eyes had gazed upon you
I knew that no artist living or long dead
Could do justice to the beauty that I saw on that golden bed
This is a creation of yours not mine
Please take this brush and in the corner sign

With my paintless brush, my mind I have trained
I am so much richer with the joy that I’ve gained
My head no longer has an empty space
For you have filled a void in this place
You have made my artistic quest complete
My gratitude I humbly lay at your feet

I now have a masterpiece that only I can see
It will now be the most precious painting to me
For this canvas and the palette of my mind
With every viewing I will surely find
The true and faithful image that today I have seen
With this, no longer will I have the need to dream

©Ray Gorringe 2009

Just Walking

Many years ago, when I was quite young
My life seemed to be lived on the run
With something new around every bend
Trying to keep up with the latest trend
Now I am much older, and wiser they say
I tend to live my life from day to day
So now I just walk, slowed down my pace
Realising life is not a winning race
I’m walking, just walking towards my end
For this could be just around the next bend
Turn left, turn right or go straight on
Not forgetting where I started from
The final destination no one really knows
The journey will have had its highs and its lows
I hope and I pray that my legs will carry me
For at this time, the end I can not see
When this end for me, does come into view
I will be content at being one of the lucky few
Assured in the knowledge that after the pain
I will be ready to start my journey all over again

To Be Or Knot To Be

Do not forget to remember
My Mother said to me
Remember what I asked
Nothing she said
Just don’t forget

On my walk to school
I had these words in my head
Could not work it out
Just did not see
Remember to forget?

Forget to remember
Do not remember
Or do not forget
Should I remember
Or should I forget?

By the time I reached my school
I had three knots in my tie
One to remember
One to forget
And one to remember to forget

At lunch I was looking at my tie
Which knot was for remember
Which Knot was for forget
So I tied another one
Just so I would not forget

When I got home that afternoon
My mother said to me
“Did you remember what I said”
Yes I think so Mother, I tied knots in my tie
And where have you left your tie? Was her reply.

Same Old Day

It’s just another same old day
In cold and damp middle England
Another day when the sun has forgotten to shine
And the rain is almost snow

The birds are not singing in the nearby trees
As if they had not bothered to wake at all
And the only sound that can be heard
Is the wind through a leafless bough

It seems the same every day
Don’t want to move at all
It’s that time, it is expected
Pleading eyes say “it has to be now”

The Dog, he needs his walk
He knows as you approach
The door to the outside world
With boots and gloves in a row

Walk for just about a mile
While the dog he does two
Jumping through hedges
To bark at a local cow

Home with his hair wet and muddy
It’s time to run the bath
Greeted at the door by the Cat
With a plaintive meow

Tomorrows just another day
In cold and damp middle England
Another day when the sun will have forgotten to shine
And the rain just maybe snow

Not Living

Peroxide blonde
With manganese eyes
Inhaling saltpetre
Through nicotine lies
Ethanol induced stupor
Alcohol Highs
Indian ink
Self mutilation cries
Amphetamine images
Coloured clouds in the skies
One last snort of cocaine
The streets to pay the price
There is no living
Before she dies

Son of a Farmer

It was yet another childless day for the village farmer and his wife, for many years they had tried, but offspring did not arrive. He was a simple soul, a subsistence farmer, every day working his small field whilst his wife stayed at home with Goats and Chickens to tend.

They longed to have a child but they were not getting any younger, but this did not quell the wife’s tears, for everyday she would look from her window to the village well and see all the mothers there with their little ones. Also every day for the last three years now there had been the sight of a young boy no older than eight who was brought to the well daily by his mother and left there until the moon appeared.

This miserable soul was deaf dumb and blind, but this day his life would change for that morning the wife said to her husband, husband you know that boy, you know that he is not wanted, maybe just maybe we can adopt this wretched child.
Her husband said wife of mine you know I love you dearly but this child will be of no use to us in our later years, he will just be another mouth to feed. Look my wife he is blind what can he see? “yes husband but he has a heart” He is deaf my wife what will he hear? “yes but he has a heart” He can not speak my wife “yes but he has a heart” What company can he be, how can he work a field. He has a heart, a heart that needs our love, I will look after him as if he were my own I will love him care for him make him welcome in our home.

The farmer then left for the field leaving just a few simple words, “I love you my wife do what you think should be done”
Later when the woman turned up at the well with her child, the farmers wife was there waiting, a deal was struck and with the exchange of a Goat this poor wretch would never again be left at the well.

When the farmer returned that night he could do nothing but smile for there he met his wife, at last with child. She was combing his hair and kissing his forehead, showing such maternal love. This sight was the image that he had imagined all his life.

Years came and year went with the same routine of life. The farmer would lead this boy, now a young man, to his field where he would sit him down upon a rock whilst seeding and harvesting was done.

Then one morning the farmer woke up with a strange sensation in his eyes and within hours he had completely lost his sight. The doctor said farmer Sir there is nothing that can be done.

The farmer turned to despair and spent every day sitting silently, unhearing at the well. While the routine of the boy, now a man carried on with daily trips to his rock for he knew the route in his heart.

Then one day the farmer whilst sitting at the well, felt a hand take his and lead him away to a familiar smell, the smell of ripening corn and the farmer knew where he was and who had led him. The farmer then moved with help through his small plot of land and he knew that it had been tended well.

From that day to this, the blind farmer and his Son tend the land together with the blind leading the blind. The future for this complete family has turned from darkness to looking bright.

Lady Fair

In the garden with my lady fair
The scent of jasmine filling the air
With moonlight shimmering in her hair
Two souls as one, with love to share

It would be this evening in this garden divine
That I would ask her if she’ll be mine
Hoping it would be a yes, for all to be fine
As without her love I would surely pine

As the stars appeared between moon and land
I took in mine, her tiny hand
I offered to her an engagement band
“Yes my darling I will” hearing this I felt so grand

The stars and moon they shone so bright
The garden now forever a delight
For me she would soon be wearing white
I was the happiest man alive that night

Technological advances for healing
Or for building weapons for destroying
Life saver or life taker
Pace maker or code breaker
Brain scanner or pain maker
MRI or TNT, CPR or GPS
Atmosphere pollution of nuclear tests
Political and particle fallout
Creating pitiful government handout
Chemical cocktails to restart the heart
Or redesigned to blow us apart
Scientists engaged in saving mankind
With vaccines and medicines to find
Developing compounds for various uses
Governments money leads to abuses
Why use up intellectual resources
To sustain life, prolong life and save life
Then use these same resources
To maim life, debase life and end life
Technology can be creativity in reverse
Professors Engineers and Assemblers
Are misguided missiles of industry
Ending or sustaining misery
Lining the pockets of corporate giants
Or strengthening the hold of tyrannical tyrants
A fight we have to endure hand in hand
It’s nature and not the nature of man
You may suffer or it could be quick
Tick....tick....tick.....tick.....tick....tick
BANG

I The Wishing Well

You think that being a Wishing Well
Would be a very good profession
A hole in the right location
Water added for effect
Just wait and monies thrown in
You would be so very wrong
So I’ll give you an explanation
For I am but an halfway house
I don’t make the final decision
I have to listen to all the wishes
I have to make a choice
I pass on those wishes based on merit
Others I disregard
I hear wishes based on torment
And wishes based on greed
Wishes based on sorrow
And wishes based on greed
Wishes based on loss
And wishes based on greed
I have to understand inflection
To justify my reaction
When I hear these words
“I wish my Father could die”
Is he is ill and in great pain
Or does he own a large plot of land
I once had a man with gold around his neck
Gold on his wrist
He dropped a sovereign into me
This alone would have satisfied many wishes
I wondered as it fell would this be for health
No it was extra wealth
My bed is not a good place to be
Among the route of all evil
And the evil that lies within
If I were allowed a wish
This is what it would be
That there were no need
No need for a wishing well

A Moral Tale (in Limerick form)

There was a man from the city
Who was annoyed with earthly depravity
He built himself a rocket ship
So out of this world he could slip
For a new life on Mars, with no gravity

This same man from the city
Thought he would find blissful eternity
When half way through his mission
He had a collision
That would bring him back to reality

And as he was tumbling
He heard a strange rumbling
A Martian ship on its way back
They stopped, they had a chat
Said the Martian “why are you grumbling?”

I find Earth far better than Mars
As my planet is littered with scars
I’m going back to rally my troops
And send to Earth exploratory groups
Your people, we’ll displace to the stars

After surviving his fall
He found Earth not bad at all
And he warned of impending invasion
Saving all life from every nation
So remember this when you set out your stall

Earth may not be healthy or clean
To leave you don’t have to be keen
And it doesn’t take drastic measures to show
That you should trust the Devil you know
For the grass on Mars isn’t green

SPIRIT of the FOREST

Morning takes so long to arrive
In the depths of the tangled forest
Where the trees cast a dappled light
And the mist lingers long

The mist swirls and dances
An eerie hypnotic trance
A ghost like apparition
In the dew spread grass

Where the sunlight falls
Prismatic reflections appear
Shadows take on ghastly shapes
Distorting the refracted beams

As the ground absorbs
Heat from the suns intrusion
The mist slowly elevates
A million demons in the air

They float and weave
A web of gothic confusion
Linger a while in the treetops
And slowly disappear

Night engulfs, its time to haunt
And morning arrives so slowly
There once again revealed
This mystical spirit of the forest