Image: 'A grey day on the Mersey' by Radarsmum67 (Wikimedia) Cast Iron Shore (the 'Cazzy') Where the river of tranquillity meets the lake of fire, There arises a bronze sea, from which headless Monsters of bad dreams emerge onto the Cast Iron Shore. Amazing how many broken ships run aground, all rusted And kelped by the red water. Saint Michael looks down, Amidst battlements and parapets, a sword in hand, ready to scrap.

The North Is Rain strikes terraces stacked in brown brick And wind blows through the underpass. Two fat-breasted pigeons Fly over York Minster; a single seagull Squats in Speke. I’m out there burying neolithic arrowheads On Kersal Moor & freshwater shrimping In the Irwell, or I’m cruising Upriver, crazy as a Lune & sauntering A Sunday Through Morecambe Bay, my bat-black cape Flapping all the way to Whitby Abbey. Of note is tonight’s Full fr

Night Sketches Over Lytham St Annes, Liverpool and Leeds, Manchester too, there's a full moon in white light suspended and all tonight’s stars are out, wannabe stars on dirty side-streets in designer gear, in dirty black cabs on dirty black roads. Drive too fast brother and you don’t see a cat’s green eyes rub past the dustbins; or a fox ethereal in light electric, sniffing a chicken bone. High on pleasure of the sensuous kind, they go on, each