Creature

Creature.

That stain

on the sidewalk

something Neanderthal

like a creature

on a cave painting

Learnt a Few Things Today

Learnt a Few Things Today.

Learnt a few things today: that prunes

are prime movers;

hashi are chopsticks;

that sometimes the least visited blogs

are the most interesting

[ kudos to you, Don],

that it’s as good to stand up, clap, sing

& wave your body about as if you’re at

a rock concert,

& that endorphins are the sacrament

that a higher power has bestowed

on us mere mortals.

Roughage

Roughage.

Like Tom Waits’ voice.

The grit and gristle of life.

The rumble tumble.

The rush and the roar.

Like Xmas. New year.

The whirligig and whoopsie cushion.

You’re on it, babe.

There’s no getting off,

You wouldn’t want to.

It’s the roughage that stirs things up.

That lets you know you’re alive.

Like them Brooklyn Girls on the downtown train

and you’re shining like a new dime.

*pic courtesy of pinterest

*lyrics tom waits

Yr Fizz

I opened up a soft drink —

You know how it is —

One recently opened

but it had lost it’s fizz.

It had lost its zest.

It had lost its tang.

It had lost its bite

& it had lost its bang!

So hang onto your hat.

Enjoy life’s gee whiz.

You gotta be where it’s at.

Never lose your fizz.

*happy Xmas everyone

Jelly Cakes

Jelly Cakes.

They were called jelly cakes and they melted in yr mouth.

Marge brought them for Ted’s birthday.

Baked them herself.

What a whizz.

They were cheery and cherry coloured like Xmas.

No need to scrabble around for words to describe the taste like you do for wine.

One word would do.

One syllable.

Yum.

• what’s something that’s knocked you out taste-wise recently?

All My Christmases

Today on my front doorstep a bundle,

tied in coloured string, wrapped in cellophane,

5 New Yorkers, a Paris Review and

two School Magazines with my poems in,

the Covid backlog I thought would never come.

It felt like all my Xmases had come at once,

enough binge reading to last me till the Big Day.

Gate-Crashing

Every now and then

piqued with curiosity

I like to visit blogs I used to visit regularly

to see what they are up to,

how well they’re doing:

it’s like gate-crashing a party:

everyone knows everyone else and it’s the same people

there the last few times you checked;

the mood buoyant,

rowdy, rambunctious,

the repartee rapid,

no awkward silences;

you are well out of the loop;

you’re not dressed right anyway

& you barely speak the same language.

Do you dip your toes in, make a comment?

Perhaps not.

Your own blog is doing well enough,

and may be just as intimidating to others

as these are to you.

Thief: for Terveen

I am a thief

a thief of words.

Watch out for me.

I am never at rest.

My tools

are my ears, my eyes,

my prey

the streets of my city.

I scan for the unwary face,

the frown or smile

that betrays.

I listen into conversations,

arguments.

Priest-like

I elicit confessions.

I watch for

the unguarded sentence,

the revealing phrase.

I am the one with the notebook

opposite you on the bus;

the one with the slightly intent look

at your side.

Watch out for me.

I am the purloiner of language.

I snatch words

and use them as my own.

I am the poet, the novelist,

the thief of words

* from my second book, 1990. Longman Cheshire

Parties in my Head

I’ve been having parties

in the top right hand corner of my head

where the music throbs incessantly

and civility is dead

have another drink , one says

I don’t mind if I do

and the hunchback pounds on the old piano

till well past half two

a bulky fist hammers the door

Joe sent for me, he yells

& a smokey eyeball peers out

is this heaven or is this hell?

I wouldn’t mind so much

take less of a dim view

if due courtesies were observed

& I were invited too

Just Another Evening in Paradise

The Kings of Leon could still use somebody, Caleb sings in his Kurt Cobain voice

& the Kurdish Freedom Fighter comes on too strong to Lynne, wanting to whisk her away with his Hindu Kush eyes

& the woman with the Mastiff shoulders walks past in her low cut dress

& sniggering sneer

& Des starts knock knock  knocking on Heaven’s Door again because he knows we’re all here and I tell him to get back in his box coz you’re in the undiscovered country from whose bourne .. well, you know the rest

while Ruth limps off to the Ladies and Ted calls after her, that’s the best part of you gone,

and Sirocco knocks over his second glass of red on the white table cloth and Jarrod frowns and Gerry rushes over

and Max is cuddling Peter in the corner and the mulberry mutt mourns for its owner outside the window

& I’m talking much too loud but I’m in my cups And I tell the funny story about the pony walking into a bar again and I won’t be put down like a mad dog

& an officer from the penitentiary phones and says, no, Ades cannot be let out because it’s a Friday night

& we’re going round and round like skid marks on tarmac

& it’s just another Friday night in Paradise