People Chat More in Pools

People Chat More in Pools.

People chat more in pools.

You walk up and down.

Say hello.

You talk, share stories,

laugh, banter,

trade histories.

Find your tribe.

It’s like being in a pub

without the alcohol

or in church

without Jesus.

You slip under the nylon ropes,

do a few laps,slip back

 then chat some more.

You can even write poems in pools.

I go to gym a few times a week too

but people chat more in pools.

Houdini

Houdini
 
She’s the Houdini of hounds

getting in and out of tight spaces .

Her piece de resistance ?
The burying-in-the-blanket trick .

Performed while we’re asleep .

The props ?

A wicker basket with ground sheet
and blanket .

The technique ?

A mystery BUT
she wraps herself inside that blanket —
a hot dog —
against the cold .

In the morning we go out eyes
wide with amazement .

At the sound of biscuits sprinkled
in the bowl
she extricates herself
 
from her woolen prison
faster than Houdini
from his padlock and chains .
 
 

I Never Heard it Coming

We’d just got back from the beach.
I pulled out a book, she put on a CD.
Peaceful, floaty music.
Music to paddle-board to.
But then it changed.
The tempo picked up, the violinists
Played furiously
Like The Two Cellos playing AC/DC.
It was ‘Winter’ by Vivaldi.
I thought, what’s there to get worked up about
With Winter?
Spring, yes, but Winter?
Sluggish, soporific Winter.
But those violins were working up a storm.
You do get storms in winter —gusts, gales, blizzards.
I wanted to get up and fight someone.
Bloody Vivaldi.
All I wanted was Peace. And I got Fury.
You just can’t trust classical music

*pic by Pinterest

the Ghost of Paul Walker

No Kangaroos.

No cops.

Just wind sideswiping
the car.

Someone’s high beam lasering yr eyes.

Booze in yr blood.

fire in yr heart.

the ghost of Paul Walker egging u on

fleeing like a fugitive

fleeing from yrself

pic courtesy of Pinterest

That Little Imp

When my writing ‘seizes up’ like my laptop

when it gets too stiff, formal, clunky

I call in my little imp

that firecracker of mischief

to get in amongst the words

like a dog

amongst the sheep

to shake them out of their torpor,

their locked in state,

nip a few ankles if necessary

give them the run-around

so everything’s loosened, wide awake,

shifted,

moving again

then ,

I can call him off

& when the dust settles the poem settles too

into something like

normalcy

relaxed, loose, easy.

The Albino

So these pigeons wing in from the wild sky,

their coats a rainbow sheen, but when the sun goes in,

they’re all drab, all except one, a pretty little albino,,

white as the Taj Mahal, and when they descend

on the grass patch near the footbridge, and start pecking away,

happy as diners in a food court, you can just tell

these guys all hang out together, weekends, whenever,

them and their albino mate and I ask Daz, ‘cause he knows

everything, why we can’t do that, Daz, coloureds and whites,

one happy family and he says because we’re not pigeons, that’s why.

*pic courtesy of Rodolfo Clix on pexels.com

Falling Short

I thought of the times I had fallen short.

Let the side down.

Not been up to scratch.

Been urged to pull my socks up,

My finger out

Take a good hard look at myself.

That I was always a few kangaroos short

Of a full paddock

a stubby short of a six pack

but I didn’t give a rats

I had the hide of an elephant

• thanks to K L Hale’s www,flannelwithfaith

Xmas Beetle

I came across a stricken Xmas beetle on my walk along the lake.

Somehow it had toppled over and was swivelling on its back like a break dancer, its little legs paddling the air.

Ants swarmed over it,

I grabbed a leaf and flipped the beetle over.

Ants leapt off, a black sizzle of anger..

I flipped it a few more times till all the ants had let go, then I stood back and as it rose into the air. the sun glinting off its sheeny wings, it looked back and seemed to give a little wave.

*pic courtesy of Wiki Commons