I promised myself
no more cold winters
stuck indoors
as I approached the autumn
years of fifty.
I promised with hand on heart,
a vow to my then hopefully older self
that by then, the words would have meant
something more, that the days
would be long and bright,
not sat under a blanket,
with two pairs of socks, a cardigan, long johns on
trying to keep my nose from freezing
and turning blue, choosing
between heating the house and eating a meal,
It is all about introducing children
to the delight of theatre,
thrill them with a funny
but beautiful tale at Christmas
when they are young, and in hope,
you will have them for life.
I was seven before I first saw my first panto,
played out for some reason
on my birthday and with Jimmy Edwards
and Arthur Askey on stage,
Hello playmates and bushy moustached Whacko
transferred from my bedside radio
to the grandness of the Birmingham Hippodrome,
my birthday, I needed to visit the toilet
When I was a boy
I believed that witches
were real.
Even good ones.
The Witch in the Wizard of Oz
scared me,
the pointy shoes
and I cheered when Dorothy
and her friends
dropped a house on her
tired withered body.
I reasoned that good witches
could wear high heeled shoes,
all black, stiletto points
and daggers in the stamped down male foot,
when we didn’t behave.
Dorothy, I thought,
you can leave those witches be.
English towns and cities,
grassy, curtain twitching villages
very little play Hamlets
seem so ordered and logical
in how they are named,
how they gained their identity,
Ox-Ford, seemingly self explanatory,
Ply-mouth, a river runs through it,
Birmingham, named after a great Norman,
Wallsend-
a future prophecy in which the great
Ice Cream Wars finally came to pass.
Ian D. Hall 2017
Love and Time,
there is no reason
to believe the world
will ever find
a way to remark
that
there is too much
of either,
quite frankly.
Ian D. Hall 2017
I blink my eyes
a thousand times
a minute, in hope
that you recognise
the Morse Code I am sending,
don’t try to find me,
quite lost,
quite lost,
a small sudden stare
into the distance
reveals more pain
and torture to come,
the taboo to be broken,
the last vestige of my soul
quite broken,
quite broken,
beat me,
they seem to want
to always inflict more
ridicule, surprised I am
still breathing here
in this cold, unforgiving place,
How Swift
We forget
that there was a time
that satire was preserved
for the throats of the pompous,
the lofty with copper bust
on show
in Halls or outside churches,
seeming pious in their pose
and their place in history texts assured,
satire was preserved for them,
satire, let’s eat the rich,
for in their taste for blood,
the Chingford Iain, teeth bared
pumping fist
now uses the poor for fuel,
the disabled to further his cause
of a bright beautiful future,
Sisters, who’d have them,
I didn’t when I was a young boy,
the thought of being
in the same room as the overuse
of teenage perfume
met with warm air
and ever changing pop star
and film matinee idol crush,
of perceived tattle tale
and can do no wrong with simpering smile
and behind the scenes dirty tricks
and mind games,
filled me with dread.
Now I would love a sister,
but the closest I have is not blood,
but she is the finest woman
Like a kite…
I never learned properly
how to fly the paper chase and nailed
down wood, I would watch
with awe as others flew so high,
tumbled and rose again
in the swirling winds, their lives made happy
because the kite touched the edge
of the perceived sky, where mine limped
and sagged, scrapped the sands and snagged on rocks,
like a kite destined to flump along as I ran,
making my heart beat out of time,
pushing the kite, willing the kite
A Registry Office, it could have been anywhere,
but it happened to be there
at that appointed time with you,
a sluggish hour, in which
you confessed soon afterwards
on the train to Waterloo
and the promise of
cinema on that cold December night,
that you secretly had never loved me,
that up until the last minute
you had no intention of turning up
to our intended date and solemn vows.
You seemed surprised when years later,
finally as I cracked under the pressure