Too Many Toy Dogs

 Too Many Toy Dogs

 

The limbs stiffened, hands cramped,

Paddy’s old Irish whiskey stamped

on what might be a lopped off head

or mocked up. Hanging from walls

of whitewashed washed out fake brick,

young barmaid who sussed out old tricks

will your fill glasses an inch from the lip,

and crammed chock full of ice; it drips.

This sour taste of sticky air is inside,

bitter tang of spore on peeling paper

and outside too many toy dogs.

Attached to hostile hobbling one sticks,

skin scored like perished tarmac,

all skid marks, pocked with potholes,

sweaty exhaust pipes puffing out vape,

up and down, down and up - all traipse

ashen faced as pale as cinder flakes,

mittened whiskey hands that shake,

gloved up against the gone sun.

A stumbling parade of criss-cross leads,

tumbleweed feet in tangled duckweeds,

toss in trash the scooped up debris,

Winter hardens black bags into logs

clinging gritty onto too many toy dogs.