After a career in the entertainment lighting business encompassing, sales, technical support, marketing, photography, and writing, I now manage and market veterinary hospitals.
Flock the Magic Dragon Lives up a tree Where he watches and records All that he can see
Flock the Magic Dragon Is employed by the state But can easily be accessed By those thinking of abuse and hate
Flock the Magic Dragon Spreads fear and distrust His backers are counting money While communities combust
Flock the Magic Dragon Hates the poor and the vulnerable And he is trying to ban websites and apps That make him visible and discoverable
Flock the Magic Dragon Does not understand why people are against him That everyone is tired of being the victim Of a weaponized algorithm
Flock the Magic Dragon Chases people who don’t hand in thirty dollars But is often wrong about more serious things And gets cops to feel innocent collars
Flock the Magic Dragon Lives in the land of red, white and blue But if history tells us anything He’ll be coming soon to tree near you too.
Image from “The History of Four-footed Beasts and Serpents” by Edward Topsell 1658
A reading of my new poem “Flock the Magic Dragon.” Music: ‘A Dragon’s Lullaby’ by Scott Buckley – released under CC-BY 4.0. http://www.scottbuckley.com.au My T-Shirt features a quote from my poem “Discussions Hidden from the Face of God” and is available from: mikefalconerstore.com creatorsearchinsights deepmeaningpoetry poetrylover poem poetrytiktok
Not all dog walkers are fuckwits And not all fuckwits are dog walkers
But…
If you are walking a dog with a retractable lead, I’m judging you fuckwit And not in a good way I’m waiting for the dog you have no control over to pull the lead out of your fuckwit hand To slice your finger, or leg, to the bone Because, fuckwit, the lead has a totally inappropriate flat rope like material chosen for its ability to dispense and retract Rather than its strength and ability to be controlled by hand Fuckwit missing fingers
Likewise Walking your dog off leash is not a license to bury your fuckwit head in your fuckwit phone In fact, unless your dog responds effectively to commands under stress it has no business being off leash where it will interact with dogs it knows nothing about For its safety and yours – fuckwit
Not paying attention – fuckwit Your dog roaming far ahead of you – fuckwit Your dog roaming far behind you – fuckwit You are taking a walk in the general vicinity of a dog you happen to know And you are an irresponsible fuckwit dog owner That goes for double for fuckwit runners or fuckwit cyclists You are selfishly trying to vanquish your fuckwit old age While your dog decays at 10 times the speed Struggling to keep up because for some unknown reason they love you – fuckwit You do not deserve a dog – fuckwit
Finally, fuckwit, pick up on the cues of other dog walkers If they are trying everything they can to keep their dog away from your dog It’s not an invitation for dogs to meet – fuckwit Or I will let my fuckwit dog off his leash and watch the chaos Like a fuckwit.
Image by Anonymous, ca 1775 from Compendium rarissimum totius Artis Magicae sistematisatae per celeberrimos Artis hujus Magistros
A reading of my new poem “F*ckwits Walking Dogs.” Music: ‘Sunday Smooth’ by Scott Buckley – released under CC-BY 4.0. http://www.scottbuckley.com.au My T-Shirt features a quote from my poem “Roll over, Tickle our Bellies, and Play Dead” and is available from my store: mikefalconerstore.com creatorsearchinsights deepmeaningpoetry poetrylover poem poetrytiktok
A reading of my new poem “F*ckwits Walking Dogs” at Poetry at Books and Beans in Aberdeen Scotland on August 27th 2026. Many thanks to the audience for their help. Music: ‘Sunday Smooth’ by Scott Buckley – released under CC-BY 4.0. http://www.scottbuckley.com.au My T-Shirt features a quote from my poem “Discussions Hidden from the Face of God” and is available from my store: mikefalconerstore.com creatorsearchinsights deepmeaningpoetry poetrylover poem poetrytiktok
Time And tea PG Tips of course Although this is more my preference than yours Made in a mug rather than a pot You’d never admit you prefer it this way Tradition has to count for some things But tradition is more often just the way things have always been Time capturing another prisoner And time has ravaged so much
Stripped away sight And with it reading Stripped away hearing And with it television and radio Stripped away memory And with it our shared past Stripped away comprehension And with it meaningful conversation Stripped away mobility And with it the world outside this hospital bed
What we have left is tea A shared passion for a commonplace habit A British stereotype all the more ridiculous for its authenticity Taken the same way – milk, not too much, and no sugar Whereas at home we have our preferred mugs Two each for the logistics of homebodies Here at your bedside, I have a travel mug from my favorite sports team A talisman of that other life While you have something plastic with two handles and a straw That even so I have to assist with
This communal act of love This final shared enjoyment In the last act of our over fifty-year play This enjoyment of the benign
I am haunted by a vision of utopia An empathetic society Freedom from hate
A culture that embraces other cultures As well as its own Freedom from violence Rather than the freedom to resort to violence For people, peoples, and states That values peace more than war A culture that celebrates those that sacrificed for peace Rather than always the warriors Where policing is by consent and trust That treats crime as a social problem to resolve Rather than one to punish
That constantly questions if more is really the answer Where extreme wealth inequality is evidence of a crime Rather than a symbol of success That believes while work can give meaning to life For most, work is what allows people to live And the default should not be the other way round That food, water, shelter, health, and education are rights, not privileges
A social contract that recognizes the equality of all parties Where discussion and debate are genteel exchanges of opinion With the goal of understanding the other side With toleration for everything, except intolerance That growth without sustainability is, well, unsustainable
With art as its center, Because we understand that the world can only be interpreted through the arts That art is food for the mind Not distraction or manipulation for the emotions Where the guiding principle of the society is empathy for people Where there is the freedom to do what whatever one wants As long as you are not hurting anyone else
Quality over quantity Ecology over economy
I want to be able to live up to this haunting And I fear I do not But I will try
His name is Lewis Hawks And you may not know his name As it has been hidden compared to more deserving outrages He has been charged with five counts of attempted murder For attacking five young men in the streets of Edinburgh Five young Muslim men And for having terrorist connections
His name is Lewis Hawks And his name should not be remembered So we shall refer to him as a weapon wielding racist terrorist And his attacks are against the background Of a racist anti-immigrant pogrom in Belfast Where rioters went door to door looking for victims
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist But you would not know it by watching British media Fifty-Nine minutes were devoted by BBC News to the Edinburgh attack Where as BBC News devoted 317 minutes to the Golder’s Green attack on two Jewish men That, even at the time, was not terrorism
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist And while the BBC has a history of audience manipulation They are not alone Sky News 43 minutes vs. 282 minutes GB News 9 minutes vs. 355 minutes And in online British news sources Nine articles a day vs. 196 articles a day
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist And he is the hidden underbelly we don’t talk about While a community and his victims suffer in fear and anxiety The machinery of the state pays lip service to their suffering While sliding into authoritarianism that shocks even Americans
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist And he is a symptom rather than a cause In a state that proscribes groups such as Palestine Action And jerry rigs the courts to call them terrorists With a female judge ironically, and disingenuously, ignoring how Palestine Action follows a long British tradition of civil disobedience Including the Suffragettes who fought for a woman’s right to be a judge A state that arrests demonstrators for the phrase “I oppose Genocide. I support Palestine action” With the majority of those arrested in their 60s
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist And we have a hidden problem Not that we have a race relation and immigration problem But that we do not recognize our institutional contributions to these issues Our institutional blindness, inaction, and action And our government complicity and tolerance of intolerance The under policing of the extreme right And the defense of the indefensible
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist And we are becoming what we are supposed to be against The irony of the BBC running an ad stating “Trust is earned, This is our BBC” As it excludes and ignores those it does not like Demonizes those it can’t ignore And lionizes others it is told to support
He is a weapon wielding racist terrorist And we recognize him as such Much like we fight racism by stopping our institutions and government being racist And we stop our institutions and government being racist by recognizing them as such By saying enough is enough
His name is Ashkan Asadian And he is a forgotten hero A hero with a message of peace A message that does not fit the narrative
His name is Ashkan Asadian And he tackled the mentally ill man who stabbed two Jewish men in Golders green He tried to disarm him and then trapped the attacker in a greengrocers with a shopping trolly Allowing one of the victims to escape
His name is Ashkan Asadian And he is originally from Iran His message is that religion does not matter That we are all human While his country is being bombed as pedophile distraction
His Name is Ashkan Asadian When you conflate religious identity with a genocidal state All criticism of the genocide becomes religious intolerance It’s not Although flying the Israeli flag at a march against anti-semitisim does not help
His name is Askan Asadian And his story deserves to be told as loud as other narratives Like the attack on a synagogue that was actually a mosque Like the war that is actually a genocide
I’m looking at you BBC I’m looking at you The Economist I’m looking at you The Times I’m looking at you Sky News I’m looking at you Metropolitan Police Force I’m looking at you the British Government
His name is Askan Asadian To be Pro-Palestinian and Anti-Zionist does mean Anti-Semitic To say otherwise is to erase the identity of Pro-Palestinian and Anti-Zionist Jews Words matter Like actions Even those that don’t fit your politically expedient narrative All false flags are conspiracy theories until they are not
“Poetry for the activist in all of us. Mike Falconer confronts the unjust and belligerent system like a ferocious orca whale pack, attacking rapacious billionaire yachts, with prejudice. Falconer writes parables that will be read by the uprising working class during this and all class wars from now on. His poignant dark humor crosses timelines while capturing a moment of our current history. My go-to poet, who reminds me to keep fighting the good fight. We have the numbers to flip the script on this corrupt absurdity.” -Shwa Laytart, Writer/Producer
It’s been raining all day But summer has arrived in time for post work spontaneity
There is more moisture in the air than in the river 500 yards away
But the sun and what passes for heat informs the locals that summer is here The clouds are wispy yet grey, pregnant with more rain, but not yet full term
No artifacts of an all-day heat Recognizable as summer everywhere else
No remains of team games played for fun that have gone on too long But there are still small groups sitting upon the ground talking of anything but sad stories of the death of kings
These are the marks of a change of plans and the maximizing of temperate temperatures The capturing of moments of apricity and of summer lives envied from TV
With Burroughs obscenities playing in my headphones I causally wonder what obscenities play in insulating bubbles of others
No organized running on what was supposed to be another rainy day But plenty of dog walkers, individual joggers, and evening strolls A lack of electric bikes and scooters an added intolerant bonus
Headphones interfering with that most British of habits; acknowledging strangers Although “good evening” sounds pretentious and is not the equal of “good morning”
While the Scottish trademark of dressing for summer and winter simultaneously is in full effect “Why sir, how does one get such well-defined pure alabaster calves?” “Why madam, that off the shoulder hoodie offsets the sports bra beautifully”
The grass in backyards is long and unkept, the rain will do that Encouraging growth but then stymying it getting cut
Unless someone jumps on the lawnmower straight after work like newlyweds The grass will have to wait till a more traditional summers day
Nobody is eating ice cream, but then nobody expected this slice of summer today Not even confectionery capitalists or forethinking housekeepers
A reading of my new poem “Park, Rain, Suddenly Summer” at Poetry at Books and Beans in Aberdeen on the 25th of June 2025. Music: ‘Wildflowers’ by Scott Buckley – released under CC-BY 4.0. http://www.scottbuckley.com.au My new book “Adversarial Poetry for Verbal Combat” is out now. creatorsearchinsights deepmeaningpoetry poetrytiktok poetrylover poem
It’s not a fear of the coming of machines That they will take our jobs That they will rebel and wipe us out That technology is inherently bad
It’s that the those with all the money And all the power Who have punished us with copyright law for decades Who propagandize us with their machine learning future
They have stolen our art
Stolen our writing Stolen our work Stolen our knowledge Stolen our culture Stolen our water Stolen our electricity Stolen our attention And have weaponized technology against us
All so they can sell it back to us as AI All so they can get more money All so they can get more power All so they can replace us with something more compliant
And they wonder why we push back “All they had to do was pay us enough to live.”
Image published in May 1812 by Messrs. Walker and Knight, Sweetings Alley, Royal Exchange – Artist Unknown
Word Outlet 