Flying to the Ocean Floor

Poetry & images from "Flying to the Ocean Floor"
An album by the Visitors.

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Flying to the Ocean Floor

Loose you're fingers from my wrists And drop my hands against my thighs But whisper words of compromise As we look out from this southern cliff The ice white perfect sharp relief Sheers to a cold and cobalt scene And green, I swear I can see green That shades and fluctuates beneath Now briefly hold my body back A tiny moment to prolong the pause Then shrug and push my shoulder blades And turn away on a landward tack

I always wanted this reward To cleave the yielding polar swell And circle down beneath the shelf Like flying to the ocean floor

She'd said Like flying to the ocean floor

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A Quiet Valentine

Just a level head over guttering lead To the vanishing line that you see The quiet sensation of air on an ocean As ripples are formed in the breeze The breath of a chest in a silent unrest Is the only motion you tease From a tableau of thought to the vacance of nought And the current of subtle unease. To recall that shoulder, the bitten reminder The angle of elbow and knee To the flush of the neck, the nails in the chest The curve and the line and the plea Is to plunder on pleasure, plaited plaited together With right over ache and left over hope Skein upon scheme for ever and ever And coil after coil of this heavenly rope

With the spring and the skip of the moment The spark and the light and the word of the eye With sentences bare and full of the urgent The dark and the secret lie under the sky When the ways and the whence and the whiles of another Are given up open there is the sign Of the layering of thought, the forming of lover Beautiful quiet my valentine.............

If she knew of the diary of pencil and paper Silent reminder of cotton and leather Oh midnight mango, Oh musk medusa She'd wrap round my waist for ever and ever For ever and ever and ever For ever and ever and ever

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Moving with the Beat of the Spring Time

Well I was driving back home on the other side Looking for a roof and something to ride I put my head out of the window and I took a look I saw a strange little thing with her head in a book As I slowed to a stop she came up to the car She said she was tired and she'd been walking far I said I could take her from here to there She said that was fine, but where was there? I said as I pointed along the road, Straight ahead, God only knows I turned my head and I took a look She put her head down where the feeling is good We came to a village on the ocean side The air was cool and the tide was high The sky was red and the sea was green And there stretched to the east an industrial scene She dragged me down to where the waves come in Look into my eyes can you see where I've been And just before I became hypnotised My car exploded and I came back to my mind I said I was hungry there's a bar on the hill I could do with a beer and something from the grill We stole some money from evil man Who wanted my hands to work on the land We stole a ship from a capitalist Who wanted our bodies to experiment with We stole some fuel from a petrol pump Who wanted nothing but to slowly rust We stole some air from the atmosphere Who, when asked, didn't want to share We sailed to the north, in a dead straight line And I said to her we'll get there this time

I'm heading for the storm on the north side Seeing with the eyes of the blind Moving with the beat of the spring time Looking for the morning sky

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Firefly

Pressing up on hip and shoulder Terra Rosa under bone Black bower, dust and boulder Inclined in this olive grove Solid sun sliding under.... Ever turning on this globe Etching colour over colour In static motion overload	Adobe tan on weathered leather Heels dug in, hands spread wide Way back when, once together Pupils tight against the light Now a sight that runs forever One eighty degrees of open night Now a sight that runs forever One eighty degrees of open night
I can see the firefly A closer star against the night It looks lost in longing, lonely Sorting through in random flight

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Inward Exploration

When I was a child Life stretched out before me Cigarettes in the bus shelter Duckings in the summer time And so much, so much to explore Holidays to hills and hostels New familiar faces Biking England's roads My grip shuddering on broken stones And so much, so much to explor When I stood on Charles' Bridge The statues moved around me While the water flowed below Shattering the city's glow And so much to explore The culture in their eyes Tempting new direction This time and place contrived Held me up and made me feel alive And so much, so much to explore I wrote in the morning When you took the tram I was looking inwards While you were moving forwards With so much, so much to explore Now with pockets empty And now she's up and left me I packed my bags alone And took the bus back home I need something, something to explore.

I can reach out and touch Touch all these distant things Fingers stretched across a thousand miles Can you? Will you touch a while?

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The Air from the Lung

There is a place where the sun never tries to shine There is a place where the moon never dares to ride There on the edge of a never ending division line There where the calls of one hundred thousand memories hide And the air from the lung Is twisted by the mind And the air from the lung Is cut in between the teeth And the air from the lung Is pushed into the outside And the air from the lung Is carried out of reach Far from the edge of the shore Far from the edge of the shore

Give me two coins to put into my empty eyes Give me some dust you've taken from my bed Give me two stones to press into each palm of mine Give me some book to catch all that has been bled And I sit and wait My head lies upon the floor And I sit and wait My hands bury in the wall And I sit and wait My eyes scrape across the door And I sit and wait My ears screaming for the call Far from the edge of the shore Far from the edge of the shore

And its a quiet message following me From the line between the land and sea

Yes I can be wrong, it's been known to happen some times Yes I can be wrong, I can't be right all the time Yes I can be wrong, or maybe you didn't catch the line Yes I can be wrong, what did you expect to find The air from the lung whistles through the trees The air from the lung tries to find some on to please Far from the edge of the shore Far from the edge of the shore Far from the edge of the shore Far from the edge of the shore

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Love on the Dole

Framed in the window Winter sun on frosted glass Gas fire low in the corner Crumpled sheets, and ashtrays Arms around the neck This bedsit's so cold Say it's only this moment Can't help but feeling old Love is holding us upright Do not loosen the hold Sparks and smiles shine bright This is life on the dole	Fingers together not so tight Arms hang by their sides Knives are out and sharpened Daggers in shut eyes Only one conversation Employment, what if and where What to do with the money If it were only there Some things are hard Much harder than steel Some things take everything After they were too real
	Fall backwards into space Letting go of the hold Flounder in ambition This is love on the dole

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My Girl
(Searching For An Ideal)

The sun comes up over head I'm still in bed I think of the times when I had her here But I don't care It hasn't been long since she went away And I don't think about her almost every day And I don't quite remember what she said Apart from plenty more fish in the sea instead I walk down the street with my shoulders back Wind on my face, cool contact Time on my hands, nothing to do Time to make plans, something new The passed wrapped up and shelved away I look ahead to a future day When I don't have to think about what I've gained And the life I lead holds no pain What do you need, how do you feel? What makes you pleased, what is ideal? Content, on your own? Happy alone? Sun's on my face, vision front Questions behind, answers in front It doesn't take long to realise

That the world looks different out of somebody else's eyes

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The Learning Curve

Winding up on a sunset Rushing in on a weekend Calling up on a new day For him to leave Running from an old friend Jumping on a new fence Searching in a new place Again, like when: That ole door unlocked and swung open And the wind from the east blew up in his face And the bitter frost clung onto his face And far in the distance, that elusive horizon The hills lay beckoning across empty space	Then you closed in on this town Then you signed in this town Then a job in this town Moving ahead Now under the roof of this home You built with your backs and your bones He sits at the table and wonders Which way to go That ole door unlocks and swings open And the wind from the east blows up in his face And the bitter frost clings onto his face And far in the distance, that elusive horizon The hills lie beckoning across empty space
With one foot in front of the other And a line in the back of his head Once again on the learning curve Moving ahead That's when he found you bleeding Down where blood cuts into snow Under the trees in the morning No where to go
He tripped and fell on your words And lay with you in the dirt Then one on another you pulled yourselves up Blood on his shirt	With one foot in front of the other And a line in the back of his head Once again on the learning curve Moving ahead Now he looks through the window That not even eyes can detect Just a thin piece of glass But he knows what to expect
	He puts one foot in front of the other Reads the line in the back of his head Once again on the learning curve Moving ahead

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Another Collision
(all this time I never learned)

You tripped me up on an evening Hoping to catch me on the way You were dreaming like an ancient lover You were scheming for what you gave away I was looking for some local pleasures Some bones and some legs to break I was spitting blood and bricks on the covers I forgot the eyes and threw away the pain I always thought that I never knew you All the minutes all the things you say The sands of time drip gently on the carpet The moment passed and night becomes the day With the dawn I woke and gasped for air A creature wrapped around my chest The colour of an idea that I could not bare Packed and ready to face the test You said that you knew the laws of nature You said you knew but with your fists clenched You said I'll see you in another movie I left alone. But with your address.

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The Flux

What of keel on night time coral What of wind on mast and sail What of moan of chain and anchor What of knuckle white on rail What of crack and twist of bulkhead What of whine of winch on wheel What of lucky, lucky figure head What of morning calm and still

Broken from the prow of schooner Flotsam bobbing on the swell She smiles in red and gold and purple Drifting far from where she fell And then one tear slips into ocean and then one more does overfill Those darkest eyes still locked in motion Though she tries and tries to feel But what of water salt on salt And what is hers and what is mine And what of time from young to old And when does varnish lose its shine And what if once again near shore Nudged leeward to the waterline She thinks she can try one time more To reach the beach and upward climb

But What of tide from high to low What of cliff from stone to sand What of her on ebb and flow Worn of wave from sea to land Back and forth and to and fro Under surface under foam Gasping in the undertow Grappling with the the undertow

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If you read down this far, well done, mail me and I'll send you a free gift!!!

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