Poetry

‘contracted thus’

Today is curtains. Drapes, valances, cornice boxes. Mafias wrap bodies in them. Fresh kills. Arterial work’s better with shower curtains. Eyelets peaking through swags and tails. A theatre called the world. Curtains.

Now, Voyager

The brown weather crouches on the business park as Tom
boards the Toyota for the flight home.
His plane leaps at six, and the microwave background
rustles the water contents in his salmon salad,
his peas and his tossed spears of asparagus.
It’s a highway dry time until the bourgeoning futures
slap him awake at terminal 2, and the luggage berth.

Now, Voyager

The brown weather crouches on the business park
as Tom boards the Toyota for the flight home.
His plane leaps at six and the microwave background
rustles the water contents in his salmon salad,
peas and tossed spears of asparagus.
It’s a highway dry time until the bourgeoning futures
slap him awake at terminal 2 and the luggage berth.

Kincaid

That was the one with Kincaid.
Bent over her milkshake at the Albuquerque.
A knitted white top with pink buttons
up to a pleat in her neck. Her name was Jenny.
Her small beagle never strayed
far from her chipped blue toenails. Kincaid
observed her from the cashier’s desk
and wondered if this was luck.
The little nose packed tight around the nostrils
and cheeks with no time for abuse.
They grappled with the idea of a couple
through Hell’s Kitchen. A Dixieland
Promenade like the Sweetheart’s Wrap
towards the street stalls on Broadway.
This was Kincaid’s last Summer Sunday
in Manhattan. He knew Jenny
wouldn’t come with him to London.
They took turns at leading, down to Bryant Park
and spent an hour reading. They walked back
to Kincaid’s and gave the dog
some water. Jenny put on her favorite CD,
and screamed the lyrics to Kincaid.
Her asked her once more. (What did he say?)
Once more. She stopped and tip-toed to Kincaid
and held him so tight he could smell her
in Piccadilly Circus.

Moving

Grey spills traced back and pinned
high on a bark collage. Janet gave me that
and a lettuce of mulberry nudes
from an evening class. Paperclip
bellies for the kids who have gone. Pumpkin seed
roads winding into a grove of feathers.
A Bicentenary transfer scraped from a windscreen.
Bled to a gossamer. I hardly see
Captain Cook commanding the sailor
to stop firing on the natives. Drawn back
from an instinct to chuck out the lot,
Janet piled-up the cardboard boxes
in the carport and let us rummage through.
A card missing a deck winked at me
up and down: a time killer
for a Sunday up north I suppose.
The blankets that smelt like milk
and the exercise book with one letter
in it. I took some of it home and ordered it
across the rug. It told a story with meaning if you looked
long enough. Tomorrow, I’ll chuck it out.

Alone

I dropped off the car at the garage
for a check-up before our trip
to Belgium. I waited in the forecourt
for ten minutes when a mechanic
showed up at the garage door.
He had a single glove
in the back pocket of his overalls.
His hands were knobbed
and folded in a chamois. I saw
two gold rings on his left hand.
He pointed at the empty space
for my car. The flaps of his front pockets
were stained with ink.
I gave him the keys along with the papers,
and my mobile number, just in case.

The Witch of Brabizante

The reflection in her pink skin made my eyes water. The large head
rolled around its neck
like a satellite dish
at SETI.
Her legs plunged into the wallflower skirt
like an underwater ledge. The acres of hair
suggested
an arable brain.
Her lips were a puncture hole
in a rubber mattress; the air
rushing out was more toxic
than Tutankhamen,
richer
than a fly strip
at a piggery. A rubber pompom of subjects
dotted her I and pitted
glib pronouncements
with evacuated fricatives. The baste
ladled tongue
lapped at shores
where language competed
with sea wrack. A gothic
carbonara
scraped from a skillet
in Arcimboldo’s kitchen.
Teeth crowded forward
like the charioteers
of the Elgin Marbles. A skyline
from Jerome Bosch
was her smile.

Lasagna

The pressed and hung pasta strips
clicked on the sill
in front of Mum’s herb patch.
The date palm housed a parliament
of poultry for the one cat poised
at the edge of the corrugated guttering.
Mum was turning the Wintergreen couch
she planted to lay a mosaic of porcelain shards:
a pink and gold-leafed rim jostled
against a half-moon of Liz’s pottery assignment.
The shattered floor was slippery
when Mum hosed it down. She stacked
a row of pots there and put a fan in one.
When the lasagna was cooking, Mum
turned towards the window
to listen to the fan’s unstoppable buzz
as the evening came on.

Silvio

All hail the senior statesman
lounging at the Bar Rouge!
Hail his calamari suit,
his Brahms ringtone, his fried onion shoes!
Beneath the porticos of his steely eyes,
within the heart of his pearly whites,
the words form music, a Grosse Fugue,
a Motown hit with leather roots.
His touch is chocolate,
his nails are finely ground.
The sun and moon glow
in his Gulfstream hair.
He whispers like a breeze
in an orange grove;
he lathers his image:
a sculptor of steam.
This gypsy archangel who dreams at the mike;
he bolts and creaks like the Palatine.
He kisses a sorbet of mothers and wives;
a marmoreal scene of back story pals,
of mullet-cut thoughts and dredged intentions.
All hail the knight with the crew-cut smile!

Silvio

All hail the senior statesman lounging at the Bar Rouge!
Hail hail his calamari suit, his Brahms ringtone, his fried onion shoes!

Beneath the porticos of his steely eyes, within the heart of his pearly whites,
the words form music, a Grosse Fugue, a Motown hit with leather roots.

His touch is chocolate, his nails are finely ground.
The sun and moon glow in his Gulfstream hair.

He whispers like a breeze in an orange grove; he lathers his image as he builds up steam.
This gypsy archangel who dreams at the mike; he bolts and creaks like the Palatine.

He kisses a sorbet of mothers and wives; the marmoreal scenes of back story pals,
of mullet-cut thoughts and dredged intentions. All hail the knight with the crew-cut smile!

Achieving Enlightenment

Just around the corner, a calamity. You cannot see it yet. But just wait.
Have a stiff drink, I would. Quick.
It’s coming soon. Bigger than a repossession.
Faster than old age.
Just a bit further. Then a rebuttal. Still a little while, then it’s all a joke.
We’ll all be laughing.
We’ll all be thankful that it wasn’t us (even though it will be).
Yes, you’ve built your house on sand after all, and the bricks were secondhand.
And you think it isn’t fair? But that’s the point:
it isn’t. You won’t squirm your way out of this. No more waffling.
Take it on the chin. In the neck. Up the tail pipe.
There it is. Goodbye now. Just one question though.
What’s it like? After all the promises? All the hopes? To come to this?
What no insurance covers.
Where angels fear to tread. Where the waters part; the tsunami rushes in;
the earth opens up;
the buck stops. Where it all totals up. Rounded to the tenth.
Adapted for the small screen.
We need to tell the tale. To warn others. To come clean. To paint it black.
To conform to legislation.
To lay down a few rules. For the unlucky few. Those toiling day and night.
Writhing in their hammocks.
Counting all the stars. Slapping off the bugs. Eating curds and whey.
You are not the first.
You are not the last. You are not the piggy in the middle.
It’s not that cut and dried. It’s not that simple. It’s not a bit part.
Although you’re not the star.
Someone’s got to do it. Every job’s important. Every day its due.
When you wake up tomorrow morning, the sun will still be there.
Your head may ache a little.
But the coffee will be stale. You’ll be left behind alone with just one thought.
An applet in your brain;
a unique and sole obsession; a stubborn little itch.
It will take you by the hand and lead you out the door.
It will do your shopping for you. And tune your TV too. You will see it everywhere.
But it really lives in you.
So quickly have that drink. A don’t forget to stretch. Here it finally comes.
(But is it all that bad?)