Neon dreams

neon dreams 

not what it seems 

inside a night shelter 

lines of snow 

dropping low 

on the helter skelter

run about 

down and out 

life beyond the rainbow 

know your name 

feel the shame 

dance on a volcano

neon lights 

high as kites 

giggling in the rain 

doorman stare 

you don’t care 

laugh at his disdain

ten past three 

bad company 

run from the Old Bill 

all alone 

lost smartphone 

crawling up that hill

moving on 

once upon 

another form to fill 

hope is gone 

can't go on 

every pill and thrill 

late at night 

broken light 

listening to the screams 

mentally broke 

ain’t no joke 

shattered neon dreams 

Steve Wheeler © 31 May, 2021 

image source

Message in a bottle

This poem is a message in a bottle 

that’s washed up on your unsuspecting shore 

This poem is a ticking cardboard package 

delivered to your quiet suburban door 

This poem is the baby in a basket 

that’s found abandoned in a church graveyard 

This poem is graffiti on a billboard, 

and reading it will catch you off your guard 

This poem is the traffic light that stops you 

when you’re in a hurry to get home 

This poem is the guest that’s uninvited 

the one who always wears that cheap Cologne 

This poem is the invoice you were given 

when you expected the products to be free 

This poem is that inconvenient moment 

when you’ve seen something you wish you could un-see 

This poem is your six am alarm call, 

the lightning bolt that strikes out of the blue 

This poetry was written to remind you 

there’s many in the world worse off than you 

This poem’s a reminder of the starving 

the homeless children and the refugees 

This poem points out the world’s injustice 

a poem that should bring you to your knees 

Steve Wheeler © 12 May, 2021 

Image source

Broken rainbows

i make my progress slowly through a cloud of traffic smoke / picking up the pieces of the rainbows that you broke / the colours scattered miserably ‘cross the dirty pavement slabs / oblivious, homebound workers shouting out to hail their cabs / headlights force harsh shadows and a shrinking of their souls /

reflecting off the oil and water floating in the potholes / broken rainbow pieces crunching under aching feet / undreamt dreams forgotten through action incomplete / images engraved in concrete bringing slow decay / beneath the dirty viaduct and across the alleyway //

headlights trace their beams against the fractured warehouse walls / fog descending slowly as the urban darkness calls / downtown the neon lights blaze, glowing their silent gleams / overhead the streetlights throw their harsher sulphur beams / creatures of the night are slowly beginning to emerge / both undesirable and seductive, their lives will converge / how this ends no one can accurately predict / early hours before that unavoidable conflict / human derelicts and dissipated drunken wrecks / falling out from bars and the noisy discotheques / wearily they stagger to their lonely cardboard beds / grasping empty pockets, nursing their aching heads //

at dawn the cycle starts, it all comes round again /

life is piling pain on hurt, and piling hurt on pain / so i’ll head on westwards against the traffic on the street / avoiding contact with the human flotsam that I meet / still gathering up the rainbow pieces where each one fell / scattered in the slow chaos of this urban concrete hell //

 Steve Wheeler © 13 September, 2020

This poem was first published in Urban Voices by Steve Wheeler, Wheelsong Books, 2020.

Photo from Pxhere