A Luvvie Expired

 

A Luvvie Expired

 

There’s chippapersfull of portraits in grim

imposturing of, oh, this national treasure,

a true legend and your tolling bell ends

gawping in awe, wail and gnash,

and maybe there's a bit of cash

and grab in it, fingering those foreskins

at her panoply of stupid hats,

like that wizard’s with a crooked spire

sitting on top like her chimney stack

sucks up hungry flames of hidden fires

from stone grates far below.

As expired as your lemon marmalade,

that impulse buy from IKEA

on a library daytrip to pay your fines,

for books you thought you’d never read,

‘Harry Snot and the Sisters Sacked’,

‘Nancy McPee Shuts her Trap’

or something equally topical like that

and wasn’t she in that shitty piece of crap

about Abba? You know, where for a finale

the bastards come back on to do an encore?

But we’re begging you, please, no more,

don’t let that trapdoor

smack you on the way through the floor

and that sorting hat can fuck off, too.

Sometimes, the Few Choose You

 Sometimes, the Few Choose You

 

Sometimes, you can just get chosen.

When it happens, it’s best not to think

too much on it, not much you can do,

something in the way she looks at you.

A flash of black between her buttons

pushing pink under the opened collar,

tight in slacks that slip past, fill cracks

and a smile as though you’re the last

or first, it’s all much the same, really.

Like Daniella puts down her violin

with a hush-hush grin is bringing in

on her lap a stray ginger scrap of cat.

Why this one? Everyday millions

born wanting shelter, a  place to stay,

one of her chosen few. And it happens

probably more than you’d admit,

if you consider it - first upon her lap,

then, under a blanket in her box

with sides as sheer as stocking tops,

he will grow; begin to test his world,

and all that he can find confined,

until some day dawns; he can choose

to leap over or stay without biting.

And sometimes if you’re found fighting,

it comes in her silk eyes or satin lips,

you’ll take her offered hand and grip.

A Better Class of Decking

 A Better Class of Decking

 

Say it as you see it

you'll have your fill

as towel taggers

spill like pigs at swill

or queues that snake

in eyes that rake

up untouched food

upon your plate

twitching like a junky

before that fix

of picking bed bugs’

needle-pricks

ripping at scabs

to air good blood

bleeding poisons

from under skin

last night’s infected

mosquito mainlined in

testing the planks

with swollen feet

it flexes springs

pushing back

offer out cushions

with a critical eye

then settle plump

your plus size rump

yield in squeals

and agonized groan,

of lamentations'

indentations; all is spent.

See that pulsing

at her sweaty temple

now says she was

just checking

that here you'd find

a better class of decking.

If You Sit On It, It Is

 

If You Sit On It, It Is

 

It comes across my desk, and that’s a bit rude

in itself, isn’t it? Could certainly be construed

that way. I always thought if Ferguson put

Crouch, Bent and Duff in his starting line up

it was dodgy; even back then, you’d titter.

There you go. So, really, what’s this all about?

I’ll be straight, which reminds me of Zoe Gadsby

who wasn’t. In fact, she was fat, well, plus-sized

and there was something desperate in her eyes,

maybe she guessed, or saw it; unsurprised

that time we wrote our team down on paper

when pissed, of all the ones least likely to score.

Anyway, today there’s a knock on my office door,

cos next week, visitors, and a flustered librarian

with 500 dictionaries tossing off rude words

with gay abandon, ones that shouldn’t be heard,

haram; would I take my magic marker to them?

To put it plainly, be a lexical filter, verbal scrubber,

put foul English language to the rubber,

pictured myself squatting for hours with piles

of books that came from the dreaming spires

of Oxford – or some other dump like that, anyway.

Now, she’s a lovely girl, but I told her, ‘Sorry, super,

it’s a bit soft.’ Then explained - not that, but that,

with the emphasis on ‘that’ and pointing at books,

but even so, she left my office with such a dirty look

that it reminded me of Blackadder’s erect turnips,

and how it's nothing rude - until you sit on it, that is.

You Made Him Cry, You Know?

 You Made Him Cry, You Know?

 

With a grimace another day, find your seat

behind the driver, say something Arabic,

sun up, beginning its long journey west

to dip below Khalifa and come to rest,

and his bus smells like burning clutch,

you're thinking nests, eggs, hens that cluck.

Lucky, that, cos here’s one, she’s getting on

coming up front, behind her, gawky son,

you’ve clocked him a few times, fair hair,

from that cut off land without a prayer

for sunset, bright sparks who assume

it was they that wrote all the best tunes,

like pull up the ladder, batten hatches,

leaving keys for kids who lift the latches;

in blazer pockets, the burning matches.

So why are they here? Ah, it don’t matter,

he’s had your seat that time you were late,

but you let it go. She’s fire behind grates

burning somewhat, shakes fist fingers,

the mist descends. ‘You left him behind,’

she accuses our driver, naming crimes.

In Arabic he speaks of departure times

and looks, careless. She, heaving breasts,

raises her voice as if he must be deaf,

shrieks: ‘You made him cry, you know?”

As if these words deliver some final blow,

she’s glaring, turns to all us other ones

for understanding, surely we can see wrongs

when they’re as clear as this one appears,

but the clock has spoken. It seems no tears

will move him, cos he shrugs, shifts gears,

spins the wheel as the flow up front clears.

A Bag of Suet

 

A Bag of Suet

 

Comes in placed; boxed red, yellow, blue,

moved from one shelf to another, sits still,

a bag of suet, and still sits, gathering dust,

knowing all autumns fall coloured in rust

and here’s her fingerprint patterns unique,

imprinted, powdered; the outlook’s bleak.

You see, all suet's solid, suet's expanding,

becoming something nasty in the kitchen.

You clocked it first in print, decades ago,

it was inside at large or maybe helps out,

not at the boulangerie, not at the piscine

swimming - that was never her scene,

an excess of water mixes sticky messes,

falls in globs upon her patterned dresses

depicting leaves in brown, dun, skeleton,

once they've carelessly lain in shagpiles

decaying in wintery heaps for far too long.

After all, a bag of suet only is a sack of fat,

mixed with flour, bubbles on top of stews

sweats gelignite, all out to get me and you,

blind of reason, scraps that fall like snow,

get stuffed on shelves and obesity grows,

maybe one could be enough to keep afloat

or else tie that sack to your neck with rope.

Sit on Stone

 Sit on Stone

 

Could be that the first rule,

is not set in stone, but written on tablet,

where you reach out, shove past, grab it,

send one of your numbers to the pool,

wait impatient, stand by locked gates

or sit, whilst your others gather

to watch, awaiting whatever their fate

like Hawks, no, not that, that's wrong,

Herring Gulls, throng and flock in ugly song

to squark metallic, streaked grey blue

like a synthesized overhead overcast sky,

and 'will it rain' complain your bowels

as you sit touching cloth, rehearsing chilblain

because wet concrete is hard.

Metal on metal but not Kraftwerk

or anything near unique, no no,

here’s your first berk, pushing past,

gathering his loungers while he may,

tossing towels from his dragged truck,

about other chuckers gives not a fuck,

but come you faithful, come one, come all,

these sides of pool make you seem small

underneath her sickly fevered plastic palms,

and the piper calls the tune. Eurobeats,

transfixed by your own, your others sweaty feet,

something flits fleeting across your mind

but what it was is gone, impalpable, fades,

flip open phones, suck straw, put on shades,

stare gormless into limp flat lemonades

like stones, and from fear of losing rank,

you guard against attackers from either flank.

Dinner For 3, But Now We Are 4

 Dinner For 3, But Now We Are 4

 

Like as some waves do make to some shores

by skimming a couple of metric beats

you think will merge, you take to talking street

and all that hand slapping crap when you meet.

Ah, now - here’s our dinner for 3, but we are 4,

swilling about on top of grey cardboard 

brought forth by some dreary young thing

who garlands a wet, pug nose with pewter rings,

one of those cheap bead friendship strings

and hackneyed tattoos that garnish thick skins.

Complaining there’s too much on this plate,

toss off witless pronouns with slippery wrists,

chittering phlegm all over drizzled dish,

you probably heard that ignorance is bliss,

while smearing smashed avocado on charred bread,

and filming yourself. Braincells, long dead, fled,

employing thawed grammar to help to stay cool,

which doesn’t have to scan; that'll take sweat,

more than you'll put into damp degrees you'll get,

way-thrilled with even more toilet paper yet.

Up yours - your buds, your bros, your dudes,

you idle entitled buggers pulling food from drawers,

cold chizburgers, pizzas, nazzos and scores more:

you're serving up dinner for 3, when now we are 4.