Cornwall loves and hates

St Ives is all high fives
St Just is justified
Padstow has a warm glow
And Porthleven is heaven.
St Agnes is ace
Penzance gives penance
The lizard is lush,
The Roseland Peninsula is singular
Sing a hymn to Newlyn
And all hail Hayle!  

But Camborne is stillborn
And Pool is uncool
Redruth is rough
Newquay should be nuked
St Austell is like borstal
Truro is tedious
Helston is hell
Lostwithiel has lost the wherewithal
Falmouth has a foul mouth
Penryn is a place to sin
But Bodmin takes it on the chin.

Previously on Barnflakes:
Wiltshire loves and hates

Notes on Jury Service at the Old Bailey

There was so much waiting around.
Watching Jeremy Kyle
With the sound turned down
Was enough to drive anyone to crime
(At least we’d be there on time).

Previously on Barnflakes:
Barnflakes' top 20 of the year

Whiplashed

Middle-aged
Minimum-waged
Retired
Retarded
The usual spastics
Missing in inaction
On a bi-polar expedition
Exploring destitution
  
Previously on Barnflakes: 
Selected and Collected Poems: the book

Selected and collected poems – the book

About a decade ago, maybe longer, I designed – in Quark – a book of poems I'd written in the 1990s; mostly terrible art student angst stuff. I recently found the book on an old hard disk, redesigned and updated it to include some more recent poems, still terrible, but I'm fond of them, so here they are. Yes, I still have too much time on my hands but it was fun to do. Selected and Collected Poems is a 40-page book of poems from 1990-2016. Add it to the list of books I will get printed someday.

For a taster, browse the poems category of this blog; they all make an appearance in the book.

Previously on Barnflakes:
It's a Shame About Ray – the book 
Missed Photos
Alton Estate of Mind – the book
Rashims: the book of Rash
Pulp Poetry

Incidental sound subtitles from Netflix’s Power

In a series about NY drug dealers, with motherfucker-this and bitch-that every other word, and the show consisting of sex, violence, lying, betrayal and corruption, it’s hard to find any quiet moments of poetry.

However, we had the subtitles on – partly because we couldn’t understand what the characters were talking about half the time, and partly because we couldn’t be bothered to turn them off once we got the hang of the street lingo.

Helpfully, subtitles also provide incidental sounds such as [grunts], [moans] and [pounding on door]. These sometimes include unexpected moments of poetical detail, which would get taken for granted without the subtitles on, such as [elevated train clanking over tracks]. Well, I thought so anyway. The following is an attempted poem from incidental sounds from two episodes of season three of Power.

engine starts
jukebox sighs
water running
glasses clink
indistinct chatter
zipper slides
speaking spanish
sirens wailing
train sounds fading
tense music
knock at door
moans
sighs
bangs table
echoes
hairdryer hums
elevated train clanking over tracks
distant boat horn blows
slow jazz plays
whispers
swords clanging
buttons clicking
engine turns
metal clangs
sombre piano music

Previously on Barnflakes:
Amazon Prime / Netflix mash-ups

January Tales

Well, I've never owned a car, TV, laptop or microwave oven
(And not just because I'm poor, or stubborn).
I've never even thought about buying a games console, or a Kindle,
Or a suitcase on wheels
(I just don't like the way it feels).
I've never hashtagged or Tweeted
(Neither standing or seated).
But I got this guitar and I learned how to make it talk
(No, that's a lie, it's a line from a Springsteen song).
But I do got a 40-year-old temperamental record player that's in need of constant repair,
Oh yeah.
But I do got a 40-year-old temperamental record player that's in need of constant repair,
Oh yeah.
And to be fair
It's my favourite thing I own
Even if about it I constantly moan.

Eye catching

I tried to catch her eye
On the 8:15
To East Sheen
But it rolled on the floor
Got caught in the door
Causing a delay
That lasted all day.

Her eye got the squash
But for not much dosh
She bought an eye patch
Which went well with her hat:
A perfect match.

After that traumatic event
Some fury she had to vent.
First she quit her dull job
And became a form of yob.

To be exact:
She became a train pirate
Which went well with her name
(It was Violet)
She sailed the rails all day
Better, certainly, was the pay
The work varied and interesting,
Hours flexible.

Courtyard cress* haiku

Covet the courtyard cress
as it covers the corners
of the cobblestones

 *It looks like cress but is actually soleirolia soleirolii, commonly known as mind-your-own-business or baby’s tears.

Previously on Barnflakes:
Wiltshire Winter Haiku

Recent Poems

My muse
Wasn't amused
She'd heard the news
And found me in a mews
Post-booze blues
Having a snooze.

----------

That thing

Deep far below

Where the snow grows,

And the mistletoe.

Sand dunes

From billions of beads

Do not heed. 

Insects have their armour

But human limbs

Flail,

Fail

Grasping gasping branches

In the rain.

Time marches on regardless

Forgetting the first kiss

That I missed.

----------

In autumn
I travel the trains
Watching the leaves
on the trees change colour.
From green to yellow, red and brown.
But by the time I get home
All the trees are bare.

Previous poems here.

The Landlord’s daughter

With the landlord’s daughter
Should you oughta?
Large, she moves in slow motion–
No commotion or emotion
‘Cause she ain't going
Nowhere.
The fat, freckled arms,
Mouth open sleeping, many chins...
Yes, she’s American.
But that's okay
In a laconic kind of way.
She shaved my chest, then the rest.

(1996/2012)

Wiltshire loves and hates

Salisbury is sumptuous
And Devizes, divine
Bradford (on Avon), beautiful
Avebury is ace
Lacock, like a peacock
Shrewton, shrewd
Malmesbury has a malthouse
Pewsey is pleasant
Tisbury 'tis interesting
Mere, sincere
Alton Barnes, beguiling
And Honey Street, real sweet.

But Bishopstrow is boring
And Warminster worse
Trowbridge is terrible
Westbury, a curse
I hate Heytesbury
Stonehenge is stern
Codford is fishy
Chitterne: a shit urn
Chippenham's crap
Swindon, a slum
Marlborough, mundane
And Wilton... waning.

Ode to a night

The cheerless baron harks his way across the turmoil moors.
He says she is a witch but we don’t agree.
The bitter figure inherits his own will:
It records the lies he tells it.
The prayer about the angels is a sad indictment of the storm that forever bleeds.
They’re German; they say “bye guys” or is that her name, I don’t know.
Everything sits on the table or moves about.
Tomatoes in the bag, oil on the side.
It feels hard but where’s the (sharp) point?
The emptiness inside is also outside.
If that’s a sin then I don’t know what.
(He believes it was the leaves that made him sneeze).

– 1991

Pulp Poetry posthumously published

Over fifteen years after Joy and I first started sending thigh poems to each other (don't ask), Pulp Poetry finally gets 'published' (by which I mean professionally printed. Previously, the only few existing copies were printed on home inkjet printers).

This is what it used to say on Barnflakes.com about the book:

Pulp Poetry started life as correspondence between Joy and Barnaby sometime in 1995. They can't remember who, what or why they started writing poems about thighs to each other. Some might have even called it bizarre. But the poems proved so popular that (three) other people joined in. These poems formed the basis of the anthology Pulp Poetry featured in Joy's now legendary art exhibition / happening, 'Much ado about nothing' in September 2000.
 The poems and book lay dormant in their somewhat amateurish state until some years later when the creators thought it needed a redesign and reissue. This is it.

The book was specially printed in memory of Joy Bedford. She will be dearly missed by many.

Available to buy on Etsy.

She and I

She was New York;
I was L.A.
She was Tom Jones;
I was Tom Waits.
She was country;
I was city.
She was G&T;
I was cup of tea.
She was ambitious;
I was confused.
She got frustrated;
I had to move.

My Moon

Moon has cleared
The night is not lost
Can all be ours
At no cost.
Birds sing
Not to be kept in
(Like us)
But to be lost
For the shadows play havoc in their head
(No one tells them go to bed).
Energy, Exhaustion, Ecstasy:
(All one thing, Berbers say).
The city hot
(Smells heightened
Genitals reek
Easy to seek
Out, enveloping
emotions).
The city old
(Dignified
hardness protrudes
in tight tracksuit
bottoms).
Don’t be tired
There’s lots of people
To meet
Then sleep.
But like a moth
At night
Attracted and Detracted
By the moon
Who
(All of a sudden)
has gone to bed too soon.
Poor Moon
used and bruised
by so many watchers.
Don’t keep on being used
it’s got no respect
and you’re better than it,
My moon.

– 1994

The Baffled Plain

Yes, I shout across the baffled plain,
Marred only by indifference and pain.
(Most men don’t count; they are too busy eating
breakfast/
Most women don’t count either; too busy talking)
Not a word comes out
Not a word comes in
Too thin
To fight or be anyone of consequence
I sit and stay instead.

Casablanca

‘I haven’t been to any place I wanna go back to, that’s for sure.’
– Warrren Oates in Bring me the Head of Afredo Garcia

Casablanca
Is that your name?
Or do you live here?
Dark sunglasses
In the morning
Do you work here?
Shanty town
Not tinsel town
Do you like it?
Casablanca
He’s a wanker
Do you like it?
Can you imagine anything else
Besides it?
Hitachi
Sony
Marseilles
Won’t help it
House white
Casa Sport
But he’s no sport
Cigar smell
City hell.

(Casablanca, Morocco, 1995; to be sung to the tune of Bryan Ferry's song Casanova, from which I 'borrowed' a few lines. Not a single shot of the film Casablanca was actually shot in Casablanca.)

Ditty

I-spied a maiden one fine day
She was looking the other way
Walking to the station
I didn't warrant her attention
Until I gave her a penny
She said "You'll need more than that
Just to look at me."
I said "I'll pay you back
With a gratuity."

Vermeer Corridors

In bed-sit heaven
It's half-past eleven
At night.
Vermeer corridors
Dimly lit
Hide sleeping whores.
Hearing snores
From skin pores,
Ignored chores.

Written as a sixteen-year-old with Rimbaudian pretensions, when all I thought made a good poem was a rhyme. Twenty years later, I probably still believe that.

Winter Wiltshire Haiku

Burning chairs to keep warm
Muddy paths after the storm
Car boot sales at dawn.