The butterfly effect

If they didn’t have incubators in 61
If mammy hadn’t chased the nuns
If Oswald couldn’t fire a gun
Mail lai might never burn
If Ferdinand wasn’t vain
No anzac slaughter
Or those black dogs
If Hitler got a serious wound in the first
Would crystal nacht no happen
No secret pacts in Warsaw
The Zionists now deny
Showers would just wash
Ovens just bake bread
No Jewish dead
Olive trees in Palestine still
If my trike was never nicked
If I took that knife to school
If joan never punched a lassie in the face
If I never threw that stone
That scared your upper lip
If uncle Charlie hadn’t died
Or Cousin tottie didn’t stumble
No winter of discontent
No vote of no confidence
Would Thatcher close the mines
Simon Weston wouldn’t suffer
On the Gallahad
Lockerbie just a place
Yvonne Fletcher just a granny
No job in microfilm
John Lennon never shot
Would they make another album
No headteacher Agnes Allen
Who worked in Bletchley park
And smoked those small cigars
No sneaking Matt McGinn
Or Connolly’s last supper
No miss Geig I miss her still
Mice and Men, Orwell or Joseph Heller
Hamlet no wild mountain thyme
No Dave Hayman’s lady Macbeth
No teenage angst
No acne
Betamax would still be here
No Maxwell stealing pensions
And floating in the sea
No BCCI scandal
The bank of crooks and criminals
No black monday 1987
And the £150 billion loss
The public counts the cost
Never again they said
No boom and bust!
From those we trust
But they never shut the gate
It happened again in
Asia 97
Russia 98
Again for us in blighty in year of 08!
If I never killed the hamster
If my knee didnt snap
Could we now cure cancer?
The sun never spread its poison
The gates unlocked in Hillsborough
Zebrugge never  sink
Millie Dowler just teen
Who gets to live her dreams
No jihadi mad men
Highjacking a religion
If hadn’t crashed my metro
My next car not get nicked?!
Would I have to suffer cats
Return to the forbidden planet
Or Tim burton’s sweeney Todd!
If I never  read Tressell
Would the north sea have more cod
Me a six pack bod
would cubism still seem odd?
If I never joined the entrists
Sold the paper
Got the t shirt
Would David Kelly never die
They call it suicide
There might be no halbjah gassing
That Thatcher would deny
Her duplicity
No super gun
Farzhad barzoff
Betrayed by u.k interests
No Michael tighe!
No campaign against Stalker
If  stayed out of the Scotia
Would that helicopter not have fell
On the Clutha bar
Mcgarrigle not be gone
Survivors carry scars
Of that fateful night
That haunts me still
If hadn’t tied up paddy
Stuck him in wardrobe
Threw away the key
Would my parents still be with me
And never gotten Ill
Roul might have resisted that wee urge
To kill
If I never tasted chocolate
Didn’t lose my hair
Was nicer  to my knees
Would the world no be In crisis
With covid number nineteen
And the death of bees
If I said those prayers to jesus
Like my youthful self had done
Would it stop a dunblane madman
Killing school kids with his gun?
If I hadn’t drunk the poitìn
On that new years night
Would  we not be swimming in a sewage Of poison and Alt right
If I hadn’t kicked in that front door
Would you still be there
Lying on that fetid floor
Starving and abused
No one to take your hand
Free you from despair
I didn’t want to be that guy
But thank god that I was there
If I hadn’t spoken to you
My life would never change
I never took your number
All those moments I would miss
The happy and the sad ones
If we had never kissed
I’m looking back beyond this now
These moments shape me
Too many to detect
Many scars and Joy’s  reflect

The butterfly effect

Jim Mcsharry 1/8/2020 (c)

Somewhere.

Somewhere

Somewhere a tree falls
No eyes to see nor ears hear
Somewhere waves lap on a far shore
No eyes to see nor ears hear

Somewhere a politician funds his pals
Few newspapers print the scale of cronyism
No eyes to see nor ears to hear
Somewhere the corrupt laugh

The game is rigged as it always is

Somewhere the right to protest is denied
By policy and a almost empty parliament vote
While they trumpet  democracy  for elites!
No eyes to see nor ears to hear
The pop of champagne and  size of bonuses

Somewhere a  covid patient’s life expires
Few eyes to see few ears to hear
A  last breath or single tear from deaths eyes
Somewhere a 1% pay rise is awarded
For handling the true horror

Somewhere a woman is killed
No eyes to see nor ears to hear
Her screams of terror
While secret pleasures are extracted

Somewhere the media reports
” he was not in uniform “
As if to lessen the collective truth
The Vileness of betrayal

Which all woman know well

Somewhere abuse is screamed
You’re useless! You’re useless!!
And no good in bed!!!
I think ..mothers day

Somewhere a sickening realisation strikes
We are not safe
Or in it together
But we will foot the bill.. again

Somewhere a tree falls
And still no eyes see nor ears hear
Somewhere  waves lap upon a far shore
No eyes to see nor ears to hear

The never ending cycle

Weight upon weight
Lie upon lie
Death upon death
Denial upon denial

Distraction plays it’s part

Somewhere a poem does its work
And lives beyond my thoughts
Creates it’s own intentions
May you have eyes to see and ears to hear

Somewhere. (C) james Mcsharry

Gothic.

Gothic

In the moseleum of my memories
Dark
Dank
Still
My fears sit upon my chest
As they always will
A cobweb in the corner
A dusty window sill
Screams ring in my ears
Like a dentist drill
The creaking of the floorboards
Crawling of my flesh
A lump bulges in my throat
There is no rest here
Like the hunger of the homeless
I see the wounds of jesus
Watch them as they bleed
The writhing of the butterfly
In a spider’s web
The dripping of candle wax
On the coffins of the dead
Something deep inside me
Whispers in my head
Saltwater in the lungs
Of a baby refugee lying on the shingle
Where’s humanity?
Its floating out of reach
Like the twisted neck of a dead rat
Broken in a trap
Killed for the want of crumbs
The shadow of some old coat
Resting in a chair
I feel the reapers ice cold hands
Wrapped around my neck
The mist of breath I can see
On a winter’s dawn
Cold deep inside
The marrow of my bones
A call received
Informs me someone died
Knowing that I’ll never see again
The beauty of your smile
Life shining in your eyes
Another piece lost
In my jigsaw puzzle life
A razor cut in the flesh
Bee stings for a while
Becomes one more sigh escaping
My lips
In the bed of my bad dreams
I see the covid deaths
Counted now in reams
As politicians flounder
But rob the public purse
Never stemmed the tide
The situations worse
Please help me wake
Just you touch my hand
Free me from a night
That never ends
Kiss my cold cheek
And whisper soft
Should i wake up with a start
Know this that  I love you still
For Gothic is your heart.

image : Bright colours only written and performed by Pauline Goldsmith with a little help from me!.

bright colours only.

Not waving

NOT WAVING

Not waving

In a sea of days
We drift
The rise and fall
Of hope and fear

Not waving

On a distant horizon
Freedom is hinted
Of beach and shore
Where unfettered we may meet

Not waving

The dead mourned at distance
Politicians flounder and fixate
On dates and tiers
While flashing the cash to mates

Not waving

You and I cling together
Fixed on someday
Somehow somewhere
It will be better

Not waving

Charting our feelings by
Moment ,minute and day
In the blink of an eye
The beat of our  hearts

Not waving

In sea of days
Its sink or swim
Hold on tight
Go with the tide

Not waving

In a sea of days
You  are not alone!
The clouds will break
And storms will fade

Not waving

In safe harbour of
Friends and family
Of those we love
And some we have lost

Not waving .

James mcsharry who’s he ?

Well i bgan life in the city of Glasgow, kinning park to be precise and began creatively writing at a young age but hid my poetic musings from my parent’s because they didn’t meet many poet’s in kinning park… for many years i was in the closet about writing as there appeared no avenue for expressing or publicising work….until i got a job as a civil servant i was outed by a workmate? Who became a great friend to this day…. this “Outing!” Lead to me doing a bit of stand up becoming an actor/writer in proffesional theatre and fiim which in turn lead to directing.

Today i support other creatives in writing and film as well as still trying to put my own thoughts down in a poetic form

I live in Edinburgh with my wife and “Darcy” the cat who is the Lady Gaga of cats!

Ive been lucky to have met many wonderful creative people who directly and indirectly helped me develop “this is a life long journey ” some of these great individuals will pop up in my froth coming blogs and poetry writing in all its forms is a living thing it is an expression of our lives as we live them.

I don’t know where it came from? But when i began to look at lateral ideas to help that person we all meet..you know the one who says

” Want to write but dont think i have the imagination!” I try to draw an image in their head I would say to them “Think of butterfly! Its your butterfly its colours are yours, its shape,its form how it moves, Now!! think of a bus stop!…what elements connect or have commonality in your head?” “Tell me what your thinking, don’t worry this isn’t a quiz so that i might find your darkest secrets…take your time”

“Remember the answers you come up are yours alone and there may even more than one answer all I’ve posed is a question.

Show me someone who tells you that “They know all the answers! ” as if life was some competion to collect knowledge/facts so that they might best the next person in the room! And like the internet that we now post on via the F and B we know how badly that goes on occasion! It’s old saying but has more penance now than ever im paraphrasing ” He who knows nothing is half as dangerous as he who’s little!” I wonder how many us have attempted to plug in an appliance wired by a family member or friend only to hear over your shoulder usually at the critical moment ” im not sure i wired it right” I find the F and B has become like that plug.

I have to be honest right from the beginning that i love the technological advances of the internet on the whole its fab! But with all its advances someone of humanity seems to be lagging behind because of the speed of change, the speed of reaction seems on ccasion to forget empathy and respect, one doesnt have call up Google to see a suicide created by online abuse created by false indignation of ” calling out” which most the time is based on a soundbite or little information or even worse twisted facts to suit a narrative in its intentions is to cause harm to reputations or worse still ading and abetting loss of life however distanced.

%d bloggers like this: