On Putting Up The Ticket Price at Hammer & Tongue

You think it’s easy,
being this airy poet dude
and still going out to earn a living?
My usefulness, such as it is,
resides in twisting words into strings of sweetly wrapped
bricks of meaning
to smash the glass walls of the discourse we’re trapped in.

Dalston Anatomy Poems, live at Ace Hotel, 18th Sep 2014

Full video of a 15minute set of my Ridley Road Market poems performed live at Ace Hotel, Shoreditch, London on 18th September 2014 for Local Transport event, introduced by Michael Salu.

An Apology on Behalf of the White-English Council of Great Britain

“This is a truly barbaric act that has no basis in Islam and we condemn this unreservedly. Our thoughts are with the victim and his family. We understand the victim is a serving member of the Armed Forces. Muslims have long served in this country’s Armed Forces, proudly and with honour.”

When in May this year, the Muslim Council of Great Britain issued this apology for the murder of Lee Rigby on behalf of all British Islam, I remembered that many years ago, my brother and I found this apology issued by the lesser known ‘White-English Council of Great Britain’. I dug it out again recently and publish the text below.

Market Cafe

Food is prepared with genetically modified soya bean oil.
We can only please one person per day.
Today is not your day.

The Last Days of Thatcher

We watch Margaret Thatcher’s
bloated face and cloudy mind;
remember the hardlined features,
the decisive fist, the woman not for turning;
as she stumbles in jumble-brain confusion;
discharged from hospital;
not long to go now.

Keep Calm and Carry On

First they came for the disability benefits…
Keep calm and carry on!
Or was that first?
First, didn’t we have unprecedented levels of stress,

Coughing Up

Poem written about a true story that happened on a London train. Happy moral embedded. Filmed by Rob Blake with help from Susannah Trevelyan. Published in ‘Life in Transit’ by Influx Press

Crossing Continents

A poem of disillusion about the conformist homogeneity of modern Europe brandscapes. Filmed in non-homogenous Hackney by non-conforming Rob Blake. Poem published in ‘Life in Transit’ by Influx Press

Trapped

Poem of weary disappointment in the unthinking herd tendency of crowds. True story of a hungover Sunday morning on a train/train station. Filmed around Hackney by Rob Blake. Published in ‘Life in Transit’ by Influx Press

Ode to the Bicycle

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/11/14/angry-sam-poet-ode-to-bicycle_n_2128492.html

Poem recorded for Huffington Post, thanks to Sam Parker at Huff. Poem published in ‘Life in Transit’ by Influx Press. Click the link