There can be only one word for you,
the type of driver
who takes great pleasure
to be sat behind the wheel of a car,
dry, safe, singing along
to their favourite Nazi beat, all
tight on the rhythm
and with the smug sense
of critical recognition
in their eyes,
for what else
goes on in that brain,
the instrument of cruelty,
that makes you speed up
where the pool of water collects
in ocean like puddle,
tramp steamers finding the waves to rough,
I inwardly sigh for a moment
with pleasure when I see
the local cinema advertises
with glory a classic of the
Silver Screen and the days
of my childhood, sometimes off
school due to sickness, when
the giants of the cinema
would appear in an afternoon special.
The sigh doesn’t last,
except that it becomes more of a groan
of diary recall, deep and more meaningful
than any excitement of bed driven or steak
satisfaction desire, when I realise
that for the first time I might have seen
There,
with the spider
and the gathering dust
in between the space
where the vacuum exists,
that’s where I should be,
no bother, not in the way,
an inconvenience
to no one
except the maid with drooping eyes
and the start of impetigo on her top
lip which she dull like covers
with purple lipstick and unshaved hairs;
that is where I should be,
there in hiding
in the cracks
not a nuisance
or distraction.
Ian D. Hall 2016
The Great Orm’s shadow,
high above the promenade
of Llandudno, the presence
of a once-thought God and worshiped such,
sits down in his latter days and chews
on the past, ruminating slowly
as his careful words take shape.
He enquires, sharp eyes blazing
as heavenly as the Sun at the centre
of the day’s disjointed topic
conversation, whether he thanked
me for attending my aunt’s funeral
on a cold and stormy wet day
eighteen months prior.
I told him I needed no thanks,
Starched,
expensive, made by hand
in a luxurious and classy tailors
with the word
sir
attached to every sentence,
the suits populate the world,
like a cockroach
they can never be destroyed,
they just live through
every explosion that comes their way
and they dust themselves down
and continue shouting instructions
to the shirts and the vest tops;
oh I would like to hang them by their perfect tie.
Ban the suit; the Burka, the motorbike leather,
the heavy metal gig T-shirt, the Crewe
They will question your commitment
to their cause,
the one you never
realised you signed up for
when you wrote about them
in black typed Bookman
Old Style and at size twelve
Font; they will mistrust
when there is a day away,
when you take time from Time
and they will suspect that you
are not one of them,
when you don’t even know what one
of them is.
Less money, less by-line, less
show of hands, just ravenous eagles
soaring high in blue bible sky.
The ambition
realised and a certain
hope fulfilled,
thirty years since it first took root,
buried deep and sometimes neglected
by outside forces,
I opened my mouth to talk
and where the dream at this
juncture
might turn sour,
dry and unresponsive,
a fool and an idiot,
I instead at least looked you all in the eyes,
Ghosts of mine
and friends
and I delivered.
Ian D. Hall 2016
Across the table
in the Wimpy diner
I reacted to my dinner plate
being put down with
“Could you
pass the pepper please Pooh”.
Laughing
I added
“Could I make you any more alliterative?”
Pausing briefly, she replied,
“Possibly, but not before breakfast or brunch.”
Ian D. Hall 2016
Panic against the window,
slowly realising its plight
and anxiety levels rising,
it nears death,
exhaustion and dehydration;
in the sun magnified window
of Lime Street Station.
It lowers its wings and
wonders where it all went wrong,
why all the glass and concrete,
where did the fields go,
the flowers, the hedges…
its heart saddened,
sugar water suddenly poured,
dripping from above and for a while
it struggles, Herculean
in its fight to stay alive
and finally after two hours
We stopped for a while
to drink a cup of tea
near the railings
and the far off sea
that surrounded the fort
of Llandudno, holding it ransom,
holding back an acre of time
for us to talk of the decades
that separated us but the love
that had bound us forever.
It perhaps was not the most beautiful spot,
the most exciting
or indeed the one that cradled
our relationship
as grandmother and grandson,
the cliffs overlooking Petit Bot Bay
now long gone and clouded