HEAVENSLIGHT 3

Sleep cannot go on forever,
the unconscious divinity
that lies at the foot of Albion
stirs in his den.
His long, somnolent
night of wild imaginings
is drawing to a close.
His eyelids flutter

Around the bird cages
in Victoria Park,
the sickly pungent smell
of burnt meat.
The leader of Portsmouth City Council,
tory Donna Jones
is being roasted.
She is stretched out on a spit,
rotating clockwise
as the flames of an
indecent fire
lick her ample bulk.
Hideous, cross-eyed goblins
and twisted creatures
from the darkest corners
of the netherworld,
emit shrill squawking shrieks
of cruel delight;
the precious lawn sizzles,
a choir of winos
sing Bach's cantata Number 113

Baffin pond's
murky waters
are alive with
pen-pushers, supermarket
delivery personnel
and the entire workforce
of First (profit before people)
bus company.
All wallow in splashy despair.
Alas, their fatty flesh
is being ripped apart by
diet obsessed piranhas
who have no truck
with modern ideas
of free-market competition

The spirit of Portsea Island trembles.
It mutters in its sleep,
its indecipherable words
haunting the vodka
and sports bars that
huddle in cowed submission
down Guildhall walk.
Slumber no more!
Tell the denizens of
the Continental Ferry Port
to gather up their
transitory possessions.
The ground is moving!

Inside the Holiday Inn
just down from The Navy Club,
seven-eyed sea monsters
who have returned from
a watery grave,
scrawl
abusive grafitti
on the tasteful walls
of executive bedrooms.
The bowling green
has been turned into
an open-air brothel.
The fenced-off piece of ground
near the bombed out church
is a site for sacrifice
and vengeance.
Napoleonic prisoners
circle the moribund
statue of Nelson.
When their vicious ceremony is over
they dig one last hole
in Grand Parade
and throw into it
a gaggle of whimpering
clergymen and women

St James' hospital site
guided by wild visions
of a million hopeless
tomorrows
allows a swarm of
armour-plated locusts
to crush its
miserable memories
into dust.
When they have gorged their fill,
the locusts stroll down to
the prison,
where they insist on
giving every inmate
a copy of the complete works
of Conan Doyle.
A grotesque pack
of starving hyenas and
bloodthirsty jackals
romp into the Royal Marines
Museum.
They eat all the exhibits
then crank up the volume.
The weight of history
is not upon them

Portsmouth wakes!
The weary giant
scrambles to his feet.
In a daze he stares to Portsdown Hill,
half-asleep he
glazily registers
the outline of Spinnaker Tower.
Dormant no more,
his true self rouses!
All doubt and ignorance swept out beyond
Palmeston's follies.
Tired of everything but life
his mighty hands stretch out
to the Isle of Wight,
they seize the isle,
hoist it up and hurl it
into the furthermost vortex.
Now he stamps on Gosport,
kicks Hayling Island about
like a punctured football.
Portchester feels a thousand
heavy hammering blows.
Drayton is torn to shreds
in the storm of his arousal.

Awake!
Awake!
The Island City is free!
Its chains lie at the bottom
of Langstone Harbour.
Set forth
Set forth!
Joy and the eternal now
can no longer be
restrained.
The age of cowardly
conformism
is gone!
London will crumple
at the sight of such
unrestrained energy!
The North of England
will writhe and moan

Portsmouth has woken!
From the dead of night,
from subconscious subjugation.
Portsmouth has woken!
From villainous abominations
and the tyranny of reason.

Portsmouth has woken!