Empty Monkey (Dot Com) - The real-time story of how the book is written

To someone who’s past forty-nine
There will be those who say
“That’s not a dignified thing to do”

So take a little tip of mine
Go and do it anyway
And be the youthful you

Written for Hans 50th birthday
For his birthday book
Requested by Jolanda and Lupe’
03 January 2006

There seems to be something marvellous
In keeping a memory alive
The comfort of happy remembrance
Is something that helps me survive
And if bye the way
At the end of the day
Does it matter if I don’t arrive?

Because if there is nobody waiting
And I can just do as I please
There is nothing to keep me from dwelling
On thoughts that can put me at ease
But the problem is this
Short lived is the bliss
If my spirit begins to freeze. (more…)

After you’d gone
Before wits coalesced
As realisation
Coldly reassessed

Words almost unheard
A warm recollection
Assailed my mind
Through opaque vision (more…)

Birthdays come but once a year
They are a fact of life, it’s clear
But if at Christmas, they appear
They must come twice for one who’s dear.

Night makes loud the sound of rain
Drowns the whistling in his ear
Trembling hand at window pane
Clears droplets so that he can peer
Upon the empty glistening lane
Willing the doctor to appear.

Dampness permeates the air
Emptiness he cannot feel
Thoughts are replaced with despair
Begins to doubt if this is real
Too fatigued to shift his stare
From what the night conspires to steal (more…)

Curving colours soon proclaim
Your coming, which I now await
Visions clear without disdain
And dreams that surely will abate.

What tangled course brought you today
Once more to pass my windowsill
How many others on the way
Have added to your tale until (more…)

Canon Clive Cadwallader
Was very fond of Port
He drank a bottle every day
But never did the thought
Come to him that his habit
Could be making him so fraught.

Every day he wondered what
On earth could be to blame
For the terrible affliction
That made him feel so lame
He vowed that he would find a cure
To rid this awful bane. (more…)