I love to sing a capella
In the rain ‘neath my umbrella
To dance like Gene Kelly did
In the puddles like a kid
I like to make a lot of noise
I love the sound of my own voice
And I’m as rich as Rockefeller
in the rain ‘neath my umbrella.
The grin-faced pistachios look up at me from the bowl.
Are you looking at me? I say. You looking at me?
But the dumb pistachios just keep on grinning.
You’re nuts, I say. Nuts !
and spring awake
at 4.30 in the morning
with two poems
slogging it out
in yr head,
you’re good to go
you’ve had your 8 hours
Reckless rags
ripped
by storm;
ragamuffin clouds
lounging about
like homeless people;
dark, moody
noses sniffling
with drizzle;
a hard, cold
night.
She wants to hear some of my poems.
You don’t get asked that too often.
So I choose the bright ones, the buoyant ones,
the ones with a lot of bounce.
She loves ‘The Wrong Saint’
the one about getting lost on our way back from the winery
and praying to St. Francis, instead of St. Christopher,
the patron saint of travellers.
No wonder we were getting lost.
We were praying to the wrong guy.
She loves Quilton too, that one I posted,
an early Covid poem,, Quilton Loves Your Bum’
with all its jackanapery.
I used to read to her as a child,
little stories I made up,
and now I’m reading to her again,
my little story poems,
at the age of 18.
my grand-daughter, Grace.
And she still loves what I write.
Can I stop now, I ask,
a little exhausted.
It’s good to have a fan.
After he had stormed off in his Volvo and got home to a torrent of texts, he responded with a fusillade of his own. It was like a naval battle at close quarters, with no quarter given. Someone was going down.
He got in the last word. That was unusual, Perhaps he had gone too far. He need not have said some of the things he said. One particular insult was, in retrospect, very cutting.
He texted a partial rebuttal before he hit the sack. No response. He texted again. And again. Perhaps he had gone too far. Had she…? O God no. It didn’t bear thinking about.
He buried his head under the pillow and tried to sleep. Eventually he crashed. But the nightmares ….
He awoke at six in the morning. His mobile lit up. His arm flew across to grab it. It was from her. A volley of vitriol.
He had never felt so happy.
You are the most selfish man
in the world,
my Friday friend called me
some years ago.
Whoa! Big call, I said
as he stormed off
with his teacup.
I still get a kick from doing
my shoelaces up,
of threading them through the holes
of making sure that one end
is the same length as the other.
You don’t get tired of these things.
Rubik’s Cube for simpletons.
The world is a cat.
It knocks things over
that should be left standing.
It turns on you with tooth and claw
even when you are affectionate
towards it.
It draws blood,
pounces with unbridled savagery
on the weak and defenceless.
It has no shame, remorse.
When have you seen it
hang its head?
Yet, the world can surprise you
with sudden turns of affection
as it rubs against you
and purrs.
*
I can’t believe
some days
that I’ve landed
on my feet.
I have to pinch
myself.
My monasticism
was brief
John Malone 