Tag: lust

Moonlight (now with audio)

I casually looked up
from flicking through some book
I saw the way you stood
Hell, we’d better look alive
while we’ve got the time…

You met me by The Globe
the whole world waiting with bated breath
you were purring ”are you in?”
O, I’m in…

We blew along the Southbank
for one night only
kissing by the wheel
I kissed you deep within the shadows
a thousand lights tied in the trees

My hand reaching, slowly, for yours
as the tower struck out its chimes
and the moonlight on the Thames
never looked so fragile…

If there is any kind of magic
it is between two bodies
that understand and share
something elemental

The taxi driver asked
if you were my wife
I turned
looked into your eyes
and I lied

Your plane’s leaving in the morning
its engines ticking in our bloodstream
for tonight; there’s no tomorrow
we’ll just indulge this feeling

In some other world
it would be alright
in some other life
this lasts a lifetime

A little kiss of magic
brightens the edges of our lives
it was a little kiss of magic
lighting the edges of our lives

But the moonlight on the Thames
never felt so fragile…

[2017]

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Photocredit: https://www.trevorsherwin.co.uk/london-at-night

Listen to my poems on Soundcloud

No Secret Place

There’s no such thing as a secret spot
in this college town
where strangers
are just friends of friends
news travels faster than light
Even in the dark
they’re bound to see as we embrace
before we could kiss
word would have blossomed
across town

These people live for gossip
these people live for scandal
I don’t want to service them
and their rotten needs
(by giving in to my own…)

There’s no such thing as privacy
in the glare of these glass eyes
tacked onto busses, buildings, banks
Casually observing every action
if you and I would dare to speak
we’d be captured, saved and dated
before we’d even finished
in this mistrusting town

These people live for drama
these people bay for criminals
I don’t want to fold to them
and their rotten needs
(by succumbing to my own…)

We cannot touch in this post-code
we cannot push the slightest limit
there is no shade
there is no dark corner
we can dwell in
there is no blind spot
there are no closed eyes
in this paranoid town

Perhaps you could meet me
on a sea-front somewhere wet
and in the torrential rain
this country’s eyes will be blinking
so furiously, that they don’t see
the true, free love
that flows in us
and we may finally give in
and we may finally succumb
to our rotten needs

O, and I can’t wait…

[2008]

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Give your eyes a break and listen to some poems

Born To Muse

Click above to hear me read it. Right-click and choose ‘Save As’ to download an MP3.

In the hammering rain of last night
I slept the best I have all week
I slept deeper, longer
than I have done for months

And would you guess who I should meet there
on the dream stools
at the dream bar
ordering her dream gin
sliding me a dream beer

Well, you come here often
I don’t have to ask
I’ve seen you here so many nights before
but it has been a while
(and I’ve missed you)

Back in real life; you live so freely
you’re pure inspiration to me
a scholar of your beauty
besotted by your confidence, your creativity

And when we went our separate ways
(did we ever really agree on one path anyway?)
after all those notebooks you drove me to fill
after the purest verses I fear I may ever spill

When we went our separate ways
you found yourself an artist
and now you’re all he paints
day drinking, or in the nude
the ways I still remember you
you… you were born to muse

Sitting on the dream couch
in the dream bar
your dream knees
pushing against dream me

you… you were born to muse…

[2019]

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Give your eyes a break and listen to some poems

Get A Room

Let me fan the flames
of your fandom
tickling ‘like’ and painting praise
watching out for typos
You and I
should duck
out of here
you and I
should get a room

What would we do in there
behind the locking door?
Turn two armchairs facing inwards
swap endless breathless monologues
clinging on to voices
hanging from each word
at what point would we be satisfied
at what point would we be done

Let’s assume
there’s a bed in that room
or an armchair
or a shower
at what point would we be satisfied
at what point would we feel like one

Afterwards, the peace glide
and searching open eyes
scanning for silent truths
for glimpses of emotion, for clues
at what point would we be satisfied
at what point would it feel enough

There’s an ocean of desire
between your pen and my paper
there’s an ocean of water
between your hem and my wrist

You and I
should duck
right out of here
you and I
need to get a room…

[2019]

Thanks for reading.

Give your eyes a break and listen to some poems

Beds, Hearts and Books

In these surprising years beyond expiry
forty and not failing
the journey remains largely painless
and brightly lit
wrapped up in love
in beds
hearts and books

Pull this feeling tight around me
another year of moving on
from all that didn’t seem to fit
closer to who I want to be
tangled up in love
in beds
hearts and books

All these lines, I can’t help but keep weaving
on the loom of all my longing
happily in awe of the ever-expanding story
forty and still dreaming
swaddled by love
in beds
hearts and books

There’s a deep and lingering kiss
waiting in the other room
the co-author of all my future stories
if I put down this pen, move to that place
we’re smothered in love
Hunkering down
in beds
hearts and books…

[2021]

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Give your eyes a break and listen to some poems

Free Line

Aren’t we both hedonists
just looking for a good time
shouldn’t we just enjoy this
a drug to take
for which we don’t have to pay
in these times of austerity
we can do our bit for the economy

Aren’t we both hedonists
looking for a good time
and if it’s free then why wouldn’t we
indulge whatever thrill we can
with just the touch of our shoes
or our elbows, waiting in the street
wouldn’t we be getting high so harmlessly

I play my free line, hanging on for your reply…

Aren’t we both lost a little
and willing to gamble all that we have left
The sun of this excitement
coats every moment’s surface
mundane places now hold mystery
the daily grind; a roulette wheel of flirting words

I play my free line, chained to your reply…

This is fun, this is free
so why should we reject it
why turn away
from the magic of this opportunity
let’s get out of here
come on, let’s disappear…

I play my free line, a slave to your reply…

[2015]

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Give your eyes a break and listen to some poems

Restless (Sequel)

Writing in circles again
I’m chasing your tail
self-referential
to edge of pointlessness

The nihilistic streak in me
vibrates at the thought of you
It’s like I take my pulse
while getting your name tattooed

You’ve got your phantom hook in me
just deep enough to tear
welcome back
O, welcome back…

The most concise statement I ever etched
the most desperately impassioned verse spilt
it’s emblazoned with your image
it squawks for your attention

That devil on my shoulder
lights a cigarette when you smile
it’s like an ache
and all the pills I can take

You’ve got your phantom hook in me
just deep enough to burn
so welcome back
welcome back…

Be gentle with me
say as little as possible
to me…

It will never be as good as it was
it will never feel like it did at the start
but welcome back
welcome back…

[2014]

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[A sequel to The Sea At Night Does Not Rest, written 4 years later]

Holy Hell In An Airport Hotel

These paths we walk
grounded by responsibility
well-worn routine
practiced intimacy
I could only smile
when you whispered in my ear
‘Take me away from this
take me anywhere but here’

Living in the moment
it’s all we know to do
as you pepper my shoulder with kisses
my fingers explore every inch of you
You said ‘the world is a minibar
cold and empty
but now we’re blessed by this heat
tonight, we’ve broken free’

You’re biting my shoulders
as I worship at your chest
real life left at the door
shed like the straps of your dress
Then you’re climbing over me
and I taste it on my knees
every drop is so addictive
just like you said it would be

The way you bite your lip
and your softly closing eyes
when I gently twist my hip
as I bring myself inside
My thumb is in your mouth
measuring the pleasure
It’s a holy hell
in this airport hotel

Those moans are low
until they’re as high
and loud as the planes above
it’s a rush, it’s a ride
to any escape that pleases us…

[2023]

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Petrol Green Eyes

Furtively, you smile
as I dive
into your petrol green eyes
we’ve run out of words tonight

My unspeaking lips
form the shape of a silent promise
to burn
my house to the ground

For there is only
you and me now…

And I hear the screams
of my old way of life
And the swirl of ashes
of somebody’s broken heart

And a twinge of shame
so swiftly erased
in the rising dance
of flame

For there is only
you and me now…

[2023]

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Like Someone Who Knows Me

Click play to hear the poem read aloud.

Through the bitterness of winter
life crawls, so lingering and lonely
and hauling your battered heart into
the shelter of some place holy
Your mind swims with the terrible things
those hands have groped toward
The grit of guilt and shame conspire
to serve as your reward

Such troubled thoughts reverberate
as they echo up into the arches
Gathering their mass and falling back
they’ve now swollen to a chorus
It’s to the ivory king atop his wooden cross
your hope will momentarily cling
but in the deafening silence he lets ring
you’ll sigh your stuttered hymn…

“O, hold me
hold me
like someone who knows me
for there must be
one…”

Caught between the ribbons and the frills
of a hired friend in a rented room
Her garments kiss the mottled carpet
as she beckons you from the dimming gloom
You’ve lassoed all your longing
gathered up your greed
but all is tarnished by the arrogance
of succumbing to this need

To feel her fingers, small and slender
as they rouse your self belief
A patron of the pornographic sweatshops
with nothing beyond this fleeting relief
Your hands suddenly feel so cold
There’s much your body is aching to confess
and your tears of lumpen coal merely exist
as you whimper at her breast…

“O, hold me
hold me
like someone who knows me
for there must be
one…”

The dance of waves like hungry knives
metallic in the floodlight moon
This freezing clifftop is haunted
by the remnants of a family ruin
And strobing images of numbered girls
divorced from name and age
You torched everything that mattered
for a compulsion you could not assuage

The trouble swells, you’ve lost control
it’s from yourself you now must flee
Still your wings, they have no feather
it’s a long way down but then you’re free
Soon you’ll slip between the stars
a fragment of that timeless beauty
as the sea rises up to carve your body
you exhale that broken plea…

“O, hold me
hold me
like someone who knows me”

Yet there
were
none…

[2022]

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I Am A Violent Man

We scratch, I bite, you claw
the most arresting violence
I have ever known
takes place between these sheets of ours
as you growl, as I lash out
a stream of fire
I am a violent man, tonight
I am consumed by love
and lust
by love and lust for you…

Hair is pulled, skin gets grazed
as we beat against the wall
as this takes place between us
You murmur, high
Senses heightened and alive
as I spit out
a shower of crackling sparks
I am a violent man, tonight
I am birthed again
In love and lust
for you
In love and lust for you…

[2008]

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https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

Song for Laura Lee

Laura Lee, she was my first love
tangled in her parents’ bedsheets
and shadows from the attic window
With my army-surplus shirt
slipping from her shoulders

Laura Lee, she was my first love
my first taste of intimacy
her loving hands upon me
guiding that desire, so deftly
through our discovery and naivety

Laura Lee, she was my first love
our fumbled teenage kisses
quickly blossomed and were washed
in ever deeper waves of lust
and learning a new language

Laura Lee, she was my first love
she taught to me the chorus
of that lover’s song
she handed me the blueprints
I would forever build upon

Laura Lee, she was my first love
I’d ascend for hours into
the bottomless darkness of her eyes
and the lines of those lips
her quiet radiant beauty

Laura Lee, she was my first love
as I learned how two hearts will knot
a little death, a birth
as she sang the lover’s song
deep into me

It’s a melody I’ll chase
perpetually
Thank you, thank you for the tune
I’ve carried always
with me…

[2020]

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https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

Lady Generosity

Lady Generosity
suddenly, standing before me
Says my voice sets her at ease
and she’ll do anything I please

The night was a vicious dark
so, I wished for more moon
and with a flick of her hair
we’re climbing the stair to her room

She’s a lonesome soul and she tells me so
Loves the silence of being home alone
To hear her laughing loudly with me
is a sound I remember so fondly

Though, I know we’re just passing through
this is not some enthralling start
That doesn’t mean a night can’t feel a decade
on the timeline of a heart

The bunting, sails, lanterns, ropes
caught by the wind coming off the sea
Well, everything is dancing now
and she’s dancing with me

I smile ‘Let’s drink the wine
‘just enough to feel the vine’
She sings of the crashing waves
that rise with each kiss we exchange

Her short hair skitters
like paintbrush tips across bare shoulders
We’ll both feel quite ageless and free
melting in a quivering mass of relief

She says ‘you know, I will not stay
but don’t despair, I’ve filled you full of art
and a night can feel a decade
on the timeline of a heart…’

Now, my body, it is weary
and my soul stinging sore
but I’m grateful for the moments spent
and feel left with something more

I’d have done anything to keep her
delay the moment she’d depart
but this night will feel a decade
on the timeline of my heart…

[2022]

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https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

This Infinity

I will never learn from my affairs
they bake within my heart but nowhere else
see, she looks at me
she may speak to me some short time
then suddenly and so completely
it’s all I feel
a love that is not real
all I can do is hang from her every movement…

Yet again, I’m helplessly hopeful for that breath
already feeding myself on the bliss of kisses promised
but those suggestions
don’t emanate from her
or anywhere but in my spiralled mind
as it fills with love for some ideal
all I can do is hang from her slightest smile…

The purity of beauty is a trap for me
my mind is weak and falls so quickly
before I can blink, it’s all that I can see
I twist until the heartbreak of this infinity…

If only obsession didn’t roost inside these bones
if only my mind knew some subtle patience
I’ll lay myself down in that spinning room
try to think of something else or someone other
but no thought can form while she has not spurned
all I can do is hang myself on her polite decline…

The purity of beauty is a trap for me
I build myself a cave so homely
lie scheming on the hope that she embodies
and twist until my heart breaks
in this infinity…

[2010]

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https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

Beguiling Sirens

O child, do not hasten to drop anchor
I hope you live so many nights
lost at sea or diving free
loving by the light of the moon
forever was never the point

You must not miss those smiles
as wide as silver sands
And kisses hotly dripping
like the candle you might write by
in some foreign hotel room

If you should meet them
out there on your journey
(and you should, you should…)
I hope the sirens sing you
songs of salacious shipwreck
and fleshy feasts upon the rocks

If you should meet them
(and you must, you must)
Take those chances
don’t deny this life
let it be painted
in such vibrant colours

Let them ruin you a while
let them wreck you for a spell
then piece yourself together
and wind up more complete
O, and tell them I say ‘hi’

Go chasing honesty, equality
give and take, live wild, love free
take care and move respectfully
remain open to all that comes your way
forever was never the point

O, they will sing some
of your best lines into you
There are many poems waiting
You can dine upon those memories
once you’ve crossed the seesaw
of all your time

While you’re young
with no one who depends upon
then have your fun, go chase the sun
Forever was never
the point of life…

[2021]

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Photo credit: margaret-durow.com/

Tokyo Honeymoon

Our hotel window thrown open on the night
sirens rise and weave between our sighs
below, a city squeals in pleasure

Neon light spills across our pillows
We feel the force that has been forged
and binds our stories for all time

Pasts bundled into a suitcase
the lock spun, kicked beneath the bed
while we writhe and rise above

You touch yourself, then I touch you
We let the sheets slip to the floor
leaving nowhere for our desire to hide

A silver spark brightly arcs
connects my fingers and your thighs
welds your tongue tip to my throat

Like rain on glass we quickly merge
the beating rhythm, that low slow moan
so far beyond those ancient intimacies

The rest of our lives begin right here
The branches of our love in bloom
like cherry blossoms painting up the trees…

[2021]

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Vicious Allure

Now
I wasn’t looking out
eyes down
quietly working
satisfied
and gently living
loving in time
with the tick of the clock
or the beat of her heart
O, I was a good man
I was doing alright

Then
the poison found me
crawling surely
noosed my arm
tapped my vein
and came and came and came
violently derailing
loudly rerouting all that loving
to the rev of the engine
skewed to the thrust of this new heartbeat
O, I was quickly turned
I was too easily bent

And
all I would know from there
all I could know to see
the only wants that dwell

They’re bad thoughts
bad wants
bad things
bad thoughts
bad wants
bad things

All I’m wanting for
is bad things, bad things with you…

[2015]

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https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

I’m Not Here

Conversations float like dandelion seeds
drifting on some tumble-weed breeze
the words are soft and out of focus
bouncing quietly off hazy walls

Invisible vibrations pass unnoticed
no effect, no eye turned, no ear piqued
was that my name, something I should recognise
or just another wave in this sea of endless ambience

I’m not here
I’m not here at all

I’m back at that table
our legs entwined below the cloth
I’m down on that station platform
my hands holding your head
I’m reclining on that sofa
our bodies charged with static arcing
your begging smile just inches from mine

I’m not seeing
I’m not feeling
anything immediate
I’m not here
No, I’m not here

I’m standing on the train
with your hand sliding towards mine
I’m sitting too close to you
our shoes discreetly clunking
I’m at my desk watching you across the office
your body floating in that summer dress
you’re shooting me that covert smile

I’m not seeing
I’m not feeling
anything around me
I’m not here
I’m not really here

I’m daydreaming of your seductive voice
I’m waiting for your call…

[2015]

Photo credit: A still from Under The Skin (2013)

Thanks for reading.

https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

Old Flame

Think the improper thoughts
think them through
to quivering conclusion
to nakedness and molten skin
shimmering in the moonlight

Think those improper thoughts
about friends’ lovers
about co-workers, old flames
about passing strangers
but please
think them about me sometimes

Thinking the improper thoughts
to fill boring afternoon meetings
and lonely mornings driving
scarce moments of serenity
always I…
think them about you

[2009]

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linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

Image borrowed from: http://margaret-durow.com/

Your Light, Our Youth

The strength of your light
catches me off-guard
how brightly you shine
blooming brilliantly
how welcome
how confusing to me

The confidence of your glow
magnetic from all angles
I’m softened in the shadows
but your light does not permit them
it’s so welcome
so challenging to me

Brighter than in our youth
brighter still than photographs
we talk and take a new one
twenty years since the day we met
how welcome
how perplexing too

I’m reflecting, always reflecting
your light, our youth
the memories hang pristinely
the good and the bad we shared
the good and the bad we did
to one-another

It’s easy now to gape open
so natural to reveal everything
an absence of thought
crouched behind our actions
even now you mine a shiver
even now you well a tear

The candle on the table extinguishes
but the light does not dim
our night of talking softly ends
but the light does not dim

It’s so confusing
I want you even more
than I ever did back then
I want to help you shine
more than I ever have before…

[2017]

Thank you for reading.

linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

Image borrowed from: http://margaret-durow.com/