Broken

 

Broken

 

 

Not hearts, not yet – that’d be a crime,

I’m told – no, consider the washing line

in the garden, planted plumb, now askew

beckoning to you, come, come –

it looks like rain, sodden cloth will strain

and science points out that sorry conclusion.

Why your frown fords rivers in confusion

a wilful blindness, or, if you wish,

incalcitrant unbelief that you dish up

when things fall apart, strewn in bits

around your feet; it gets right on my tits.

A sort of a Shinigami syndrome,

I turn my back on you; it’s broken,

reaching for my wallet, pulling out cards –

surely if something’s serviced, it continues,

but without effort it’s next to no use.

Such Stuff

 

Such Stuff

 

Sometimes there’s a flurry of interest

in some older lines

I wrote, when the universe

was less than half its present size

and such wisdom I was gifted was not wise.

These words wrote for bad luck – named for 96 -

penned 10 years ago when I was sick,

and, as such, more a McFlurry of a poem

rather than a stiff breeze

raking her insubstantial hands through leaves

to pour over what can be read

in such shed skeletons littered there.

Such stuff is hard to scan,

some younger self buried within

interred in murky caverns where

the only touch is the feeling fingers of despair

scoping mossy walls.

Ah – we’re scarcely there at all:

Recall, it was dubbed voluntary

but do it - or we'll all go to the wall -

they’d offered parting presents, a speech

from his own to each –

‘Here’s a record voucher, take it to Pete’s.’

At first you refused, shook a sullen head,

but, acquiesced, spared shame – redeemed it:

there was no love - blank slates

that waxed lyrical and £20,000, give or take.

So, you can see, any words from then

are tainted like a sailor’s tar–dyed nails,

scarred autumn brown; when I sailed

I left a mess behind, well, you do

when it’s sprung like a trap – it’s true

she said she’d wait, but I don’t blame her:

I did, you understand? It burnt,

tormented those coils within until unlearnt,

a rubbing of sea salt into rashes - make it sting,

flesh abraded, buffed raw, to delight in singing

dirges – yo-heave-ho – something Siberian.

Leave it at that –

ten years after the fact, those words

were mulch, a sediment forked

after all that was said and more that was thought –

such stuff

as blossomed windfall apples.

Like As the Blackbird

 

Like As the Blackbird

 

 

Like as the blackbird uproots the sparrow

who offers temerity as occupied space,

so do you, one unsown day, stride the narrow

Cornish quiet lanes, strewn like straw – make haste

while the sun burns golden fields fallow.

On the right flood tides have swollen Truro River,

placid she lies, satisfied, hardly a contraction –

‘Push,’ you think, ‘Let’s see action,’

for nothing so deep can ever be empty,

scoped troughs disclose her horn of plenty

where Lady Mary Killigrew’s ghost mans sentry.

So, now, here’s a dog – a real beast – carnivore

that snaps your leash between his jaws,

not one of your crawling mops – arrow straight,

he leaps out to symphonies, a dreadnought,

an iron spine, a bulwark cutting barely a wake,

who yields at last to his master’s voice.

Rounding the bend – as if there ever was choice –

come across at last those squat dwellings

that bed themselves into rocks, hang off cliffs

like a crooked mouth full of milk-teeth

in need of dentist, tooth fairy or both maybe,

rest awhile, sip beer, look to see that same blackbird

harrying near, ‘Release! Let slip! Take flight!’

It’s but a fancy – but even as the day becomes night,

let Robert Culliford push open floodgates and write.

String Beings

 

String Beings

 

 

Let’s talk leads, the cheap nylon sort,

dyed, red, green, blue; an eye for a hook,

just one notch up from baler string - look,

they’re sprouting like runner beans supported

by cack-handed, fist planted bamboo cane,

hanging off bent nails in budget petshops.

You know, leads presuppose guidance,

direction, the firm hand of a flight lieutenant,

chocks away – they’re off. Here’s a couple

with a fistful of dogs, small - burnt crumpets

on four legs with barks like toy trumpets -

your Mini-Milks scraped off the bottom

of the Poundland ice cream freezer

bargain basement acquisitions, less Caesar

more seized, hung bags of shit from trees

comes extra. They’re tripping the Gay Gordons

in a Gordian knot of cat’s cradles, cordoning

off safe passage, choking thoroughfares,

any protests made falling on deaf ears –

like: ‘Hey, walking here, I’m walking here!’

too late – dog’s seen the rabbit, he’s off,

owners phone scrolling, vaping or moths

to any gossip candle, hers on hers and hers,

in words tossed out so fast they’re blurred,

sheep in wolves’ clothing tugging herds.

‘Well, did you hear, did you hear, no, well -’

if words were mince there’d be pies enough,

shepherds a-plenty would have their fill,

most of them on pills, ill defined diseases,

dragging their dolly-dogs just as they please –

‘You can’t bring that bloody thing in here,

she says to me, there’s produce to flog.’

Strange – you don’t see guide dogs

as much anymore, negotiating safe routes -

who knows, maybe they’ve been crowded out.

You’d like to remonstrate with them, shout,

but no such luck -        

ah, you’d envy the life of a root vegetable

just before it’s plucked.

The Sunken Kingdom of Lyonesse

 

The Sunken Kingdom of Lyonesse

 

 

‘Will all Great Neptune –‘ Trevillion cries,

on horseback mounted; bound for St Michael’s:

between a trot and canter, abandoning lance,

raising his visor, skimming his hevva dance

on top of black churning backwash.

Did not the sea lick hooves, lap fetlocks,

advance on her pastern? As the land dropped,

Admiral Benbow himself stirred his ghost

to walk Chapel Street from post to post,

summoned Baines – ‘Cease your spinning,

there are greater yarns than these to be told.’

For it has come to this – that gold scimitar

bending Marazion into Mousehole far

as soft Devonian bounded by granite blocks,

owes dues to her serpentine and schist rocks –

is invaded, has fallen. Dogs, choked by string

do strut and fret, yap at the smallest thing

that stirs within oceans deep, trip the unwary,

lift legs to leave their mustard marks.

Baying hollowed hordes bellow nothings

to scroll and ring across the retreating bay –

there is nothing left they did not nothing say.

And that once great Kingdom of Lyonesse

sucked reefs - fled to sink itself within distress.

Things I Gotta Do

 

Things I Gotta Do

 

 

It’s easy to grasp when you reach back pages,

the climax passed or you’re racing

towards it fast – antique thumbprints

and rickety fingers turning down corners,

reluctant to put it aside, turn off the light

there goes another day, here comes the night.

Assuming you read, crack codes - some still do,

but I wouldn’t blame you –

an underrated pastime by an overrated mass,

but mostly let’s just let it pass.

Last night, my Grandson, pushing grub

around his plate gave me a surreptitious nudge –

‘Put it on here, son,’ I hissed, tapping my plate,

but later accidentally let it slip, game’s up –

so after tea, we’re off down the park,

shooting hoops, hoofing football, laughed -

You see? Things we gotta do

that don’t apply to me and you.

I’m not sure you’re a fan of the beautiful game,

you took up guitar, put it down again,

music brings on rashes, writing’s a chore –

but fair play, I can’t stick rugby, fucking boring,

and no way I’m pounding streets to keep fit.

There, you see, that’s an end to it,

really, don’t you think? Nothing personal, rude –

it’s philosophy, how we see things, in the end

I won’t expect you and don’t expect me to bend

or overlay your charts onto my maps -

we're goalkeepers with nothing left to defend,

backing into nets when games end.

Stepping Stones

 

Stepping Stones

 

 

She says: ‘Is this it for me?’

You returned from overseas,

a longish stint, nothing comes easy –

with war chucked in for good measure,

triggered for the pleasure

of those wired enough to plunge detonators.

 

But, she doesn’t want any rows,

talking New Zealand, couple of years from now –

fourth or fifth trip, who’s counting?

 

You’ve refused to go, but will foot the bill,

way past a dubious thrill

of seeing mountains behind more mountains

and with two brothers coming here anyway

to rubber boot your holiday,

you’re thinking ‘Here it goes again.’

 

Is that a slight rash,

left side, where your balls chafe your leg?

You walk a lot, note it all down most days,

then sit solo upstairs, writing as the records play,

grateful distractions have upped and fled

churning sour milk into butter.

 

Let’s think on retirement.

It’s fanciful – maybe an allotment,

try your hand at cultivating produce,

healthy, you know?

But looks like that aren’t made, they’re born.

 

Settled in front of the television, yawns –

‘And what do you know of such things.’

It’s ‘Little House on the Prairie’ and he’s fixing stuff

bellyaching there’s not enough

money in his pocket, food on the table:

unhitches the team and plough from the stable.

 

You’re asking whether she’s gone blind, yet,

and, met with a double negative,

point out 5 years ago you were playing air

until someone planted a guitar there;

think of the band – she thinks, she groans.

 

Later, you tell him ‘Let’s go!’

to where weeks of heat has made the river low,

spot fishes by banks, gaze at it flow

and practise laughing on the stepping stones.

Ruby, Woah

 

Ruby, Woah

 

 

Does the past exist in black and white?

I’ve seen the pictures - grimaces in grim sepia tones,

couples that bleed together looking alone,

dustbowl smiles that failed to cultivate

prairies of salted paper prints – three by three inch -

and possessed of thick, forbidding borders.

 

Today, we’ve a pre-season friendly,

nothing of consequence, but we arrive early -

mighty Truro to be toasted - flash-roasted

by your hubristic Exeter City who – with maximum fuss,

swaggered off the bus and lost.

 

Hard to put fingers on how. Their number 15 blazed

resplendent red trails, raised fire-streaks on green baize,

but we’ve our very own indigo Harry Kane

mighty in mid-field, steals a penalty,

lashes it home between the milk-white frame

and the onion bag bulges.

 

Post match, he’s on his phone, though –

‘Grandad, hurry, we’ve got to go,’

and he’s tackling the viridian verges,

sprinting ahead, square on square, a paintbox splurge,

hurtling crossroads, hurdling kerbs

and I’m sweating to match him under buttercup sun.

 

‘What’s the hurry, son?’

He’s tight lipped, has to get to the gym, pre-closing,

pump his upper-body, grind his traps -

points to the car-park where his mother’s waiting

to pick me, dashes inside – an iridescent flash.

 

‘Ah, that’ll be Ruby, his friend.’ she clarifies,

and I speculate, but, ‘No, she’s 18.’

But I remembered how Mary Wilson made me putty

in the upper sixth, how lucky

I felt just to scent her auburn tresses, her swishing dresses,

how I soared when she let me take her hand.

 

Even to this day, my pulse still can race, take first place,

mount podiums for dazzling medals -

I ragged him later, a little, scanned his face –

he denied it with a crimson blush that bloomed, flourished,

looked back on this match. It didn’t matter;

 

we’d queued for beer, Coke for him, heard the clatter

of expectant cheers, prism crews, mosaics all limbering up,

asked a fellah behind us – if we pose, take a shot

for remembrance - I grin gawky from over his shoulder,

looking back at him getting older –

how his past detonates forever colours.

Them’s The Breaks

 

Them’s The Breaks

 

 

All this hot weather turns milk sour,

the bottoming globs glower

while sallow whey rises to the top –

feels wrong, looks wrong, is wrong:

a sort of tie-dyed, jaundiced,

cheesecloth shock-mop to slop

out flushed specks that exit the carton

with dragging feet and harden.

Nothing doing for my coffee, then,

I lay down my almost eager pen

and slap in slippers the odd mile or so

into town. It’s early, coming seven,

half risen sun’s scrubbing out heavens –

I’m thinking ‘Spar’s convenient’,

or so they continually claim.

Coming down by the viaduct, endgame

within reach, I spot two by the door,

smoking, vaping, all the same –

studying my approach, detached.

I can see they’ve not lifted the latch

yet, watching with expectation.

I’ve already predicted explanations:

‘Sorry, dear, don’t open ‘til 7.30,’

all caretaker language, Ms Honey tones,

they even set aside their phones -

think manicured nails down blackboard,

Stradivarius mistuned, misbowed,

a warbling chorus of rough crows,

G-string’s bust, half simpered sympathy,

the rest pure smug-shot; I care not.

‘Them’s the breaks,’ I might’ve mumbled -

didn’t – changed direction, stumbled

a jot – like you do – made the Co-Op.

clutching the blessed pint in my fist,

I set back the way I came, deep breaths,

of course, it’s bloody open by now,

but I’m hoping what they blow they suck –

and - I suppose - glad it was only dear:

not bro, mate, buddy or chuck.

Mr Chips

 

Mr Chips

 

 

Catchphrase, ITV – a sweaty, smirking, Roy Walker,

thieving pairs of donkey’s hind-legs -

Poor legless bastards, bemused, sit up and beg –

‘Can you say what you see? What it is yet?’

Here’s Mr Chips, hiding behind a celebrity square,

doing something suspect, all hands - you’d swear

on tribes of honest injun’s tripping the Can Can –

it shouldn’t happen to a vet, let alone a man.

All this is apropros of nothing, random beliefs

like when you’d not bothered brushing your teeth,

there’s a smell sweet - tuna fish, is it? Good grief.

Now, there was this dog, probably shaggy, his tail

wagging as you entered Archie’s pub, a talker?

Not much of one, but he had a hot trick or two

under his collar, he’d go on the nick, like they do,

partial to a bag of cheese and onion. Now, the boxes,

well, they were on the floor, with holes your socks

would be proud of, cut out - he could get his snout

in there quicker than your liminal zone could shout,

‘Crisps!’ Which we all did. Frequently. ‘Crisps!’

And he’s off and at them, bagged him a packet,

settles it between his front paws, then, snags it

with his canny teeth and he’s having his portion.

Bad breath? Wouldn’t get close, if you’re asking.

Poor Archie, at his wits end, he’s multi-tasking,

begging us, ‘Fellahs, don’t say ‘Crisps’!’

So, of course, we did it more, so did the labrador,

its belly getting so big, it’s scrubbing the floor,

which had to help, right? Until, one day, dog’s dead.

I stopped going after that, don’t know why -

well, I do - but I found new pubs, invited in, ‘Drink!’

they’d say, ‘Drink!’ You’re by toilets, under sinks

black holes getting blacker until there was only black.

‘Say what you see.’ Not much, actually, looking back,

made my considered choice, revealed a square,

exposed Roy Walker and Mr Chips crowing there.

Thickets

 

Thickets

 

 

There’s no shortage of degenerative growth

every morning - taking a reassuring swallow

of agreeably bitter coffee, thick on the throat,

draining a mug to fill the hollows.

On brambled trees, deep throaty chokes

of wood pigeons, birdbrains all, but he’s low –

a baritone east of bass, what he knows

he surely rumbles to tendrils tugging fences –

ineffectual barriers; last lines of defences.

 

They could only keep electricity switched on

haphazardly, Coker, Masen and the rest,

some hazard Wyndam drafted in to advance tension

and the Triffids, ramming barricades, were blessed

with a primal intelligence such vegetation

must surely have, an urge to usurp what was left –

and there was a sickness that flew the night,

linked to circumnavigating, artificial satellites

ringing lines of latitude like necks; burning bright.

 

There’s a beauty deep in those woods

beyond pickets, dark sung songs for everyone

composed carelessly from indifferent thickets - should

mean something, but don’t. Yesterday, spending long

hours scrubbing dust, carpets thick with floods

of undisturbed mites, she’s calling from beyond:

We must go home, dear, where you and I belong.

And, on the orders of some listless general

another child lies injured by the falling shrapnel.

Cumberbatch

 

Cumberbatch

 

 

‘Where’s your England shirt?’ I asked the Grandson,

14, young, strong, doesn’t have one –

so, I told him, ‘try one of mine for size’,

nothing doing there – ‘too big, too old’ - he cries,

wiser eyes than mine on the bigger prize.

 

I’d picked a Beckham, 7, from some tournament, long lost -

maybe from that time we’d tossed

pairs of plastic St George daubed hand clappers at the big screen,

got thrown out, banned forthwith, watched dreams

sail on, sail on down the line, Rooney’s off, Ronaldo winks,

the whole reel reeks, your heart sinks.

 

Half an hour until Sports Direct shuts tonight

2 hours until kick off, haring down Pydar Street,

that’s him and me – he picks a blue top,

they’re all out of white, red – none in stock –

you notice she doesn’t say, ‘due to popular demand’,

or some other cliché – still, he’s looking grand

in medium and, as I pay, I feel I should say

to her, ‘he should be prepared for decades of pain,’

but puts me in my place,

with her quiet titter, ‘I don’t own one.’

 

BBC1, we’ve switched it on,

I played ‘3 Lions’, ‘World in Motion’ - New Order - 12 inch,

what else? Done the Age UK nostalgia tour, put drinks,

your heart sinks, Chapman, Shearer, Mowbray –

quips about Lineker, cut and pasting poor taste – all they say

is guaranteed to court disaster and the best saved for last,

ill-informed public chestnuts then your very own Cumberbatch.

 

He’s a silhouette, throwing shade, rocking ‘With the Beatles’,

almost black and white, but not quite, nearly regal:

‘Seize,’ says he, ‘The Day! You lions!’ or some such crap,

that tumbles like clowns, pratfalls into your lap - that’s that.

 

Yesterday, I bought him his first England shirt,

then, when sleep flirted from behind her skirts,

stared at the ceiling, pondering a world of hurt.

 

Tonight Tonight Tonight

 Tonight Tonight Tonight

Let’s all get up and dance to a song

that was a hit – there’s fragments of it,

shake yourself from an afternoon kip –

let slip slumber, lose any grip

of internal worlds you’d unspooled and projected.

It’s half of two, give or take –

day of a big game - well they’re all big, this late

on in tournaments, England Norway -

He would’ve loved that, found a pub somewhere,

wittered on about live atmospheres,

Erling Haaland – you don’t get much more

corporeal than him – certain to score –

press sharpening knives, watch how he skives

on the park, but, boy, he’s sharp.

Find yourself in town, wandered down

from Angel Towers - some excuse about potatoes,

sun’s a thieving crook, gone and took

what water he can squeeze from your sponge –

and although you mostly avoid pubs

you still hang on to the Con Club –

paying annual subs

for a final bolt-hole that could prove handy -

nip inside order ice-cool shandy.

Maybe you’re halfway through

when you’re recognised –

hailed with a ruck of a shout, a hearty maul,

but you don’t remember his face at all,

later, when he’s off for a slash

you make a quick pass at boy bartender,

confess you can’t remember

who the hell he is – but didn’t you hide it well?

Jason’s back, now you’re in the know –

recalling how we used to go

with Chris … remember Old Trafford, England game,

we had more than a few, him, me, you,

he bought his lad – no, no, that was my boy –

was it? You fell down the steps,

well, we was all fucking wrecked,

twenty years back along, Steve McClaren, Rooney,

and City, lifting the Vase at Wembley -

choker about Chris – let’s not go there –

no, no, you’re right, shit, one day, he’s just gone –

I know – passed on, it’s just bloody wrong,

isn’t it? It was, like – let’s not bring it all back,

he was my best friend, come on,

I’ll put one in, have another one…

You make your escape,

but City have got Exeter, Saturday next, pre-season

friendly, well, there’s another reason

to hang on, you guess,

agree to catch up in the bar, bring the Grandson,

because we all belong

to some sort of football family.

And if he could brush ashes from his eyes,

wake up from an afternoon kip,

wonder what he’d make of it?

Your Own Now

 Your Own Now

If you often find yourself on your own now,

let me point out - the observer once observed

is just as valid – it depends on how

fast your relative’s travelling – 

If they blaze a fulgent curve,

well, case closed, it means you’re no more real 

than them. You ask - are you able to feel

the way I feel, if every present is present

and every now is now?

Evidently. The off-side rule laments bereft,

hides under beds in plain sight of the ref

until pronounced hereby abolished

and told to take up dust-moting instead.

Pitiful pastimes, these, watching drops racing drops,

thinking about how many sailor’s socks

I might have darned, if I’d stayed in, not left her

to take her up – 

We’re walking Cornish woods,

where we’d often talked in woulds and coulds

when I felt my present take your present’s hand

in mine – and it stopped me there -

while your ghost fingers combed my hair -

but someone observing us at light speed

saw that you were much more real than me - indeed

they sighed and said - I was the one who'd died.

Fruitcakes

 

Fruitcakes

 

 

Some boffin’s gone and crossed

a croissant with a muffin,

called it shitzhu, mufftini, something –

pumped the whole thing full of vanilla,

so you can’t taste nothing -

witness Fanny Craddock’s grief,

thrill as your Galloping Gourmet sprays

short slurps on studio floors in disbelief –

he never met a cab he didn’t like,

might order one; take flight.

I saw him platforming, up and down,

not Graham, but another fruitcake,

a sultana short - across his brow

what he thought might make for a fierce frown

rucksacked, like me, T-shirt, too –

anything could happen in the next half hour,

where’s Troy Tempest? That’s him,

accosting other travellers waiting

on the 8.15 from Manchester –

well, Penzance lacks the glamour

and I think, if he packed a hammer,

we’d stand back, plea bargain, submit,

but he hadn’t, just screaming shit

looking the very picture of pain,

as if the world and its people are insane –

lunatics breeding pastry crescents,

Pillsbury Doughboys in want of crust stuffing -

he’s in, out, up, down, tugging his cuffs

grilling those he can’t trust,

winkling them out for a shower of spit –

he’s finding plenty of material

to get to grips with – saves his best bit

for two bearded blokes giving it dap,

because in his head he’s got their backs,

better believe it, buddy –it’s your lucky day.

We’ll shuffle uncomfortable, look away

as though he’s wraithlike, doesn’t exist,

well, that’s the best way to deal with it,

after all, who here can honestly say

he’s wrong? There are some there

who thought Gareth Gates was a neat idea,

watched Mad Lizzie wake up and dance,

and absolutely swear by Lemsip –

it’s either heartsease or heartache

until they think up something else to bake

he’s just trying to ward a world off fruitcake.

They’d Quite Like To Apologise

 

They’d Quite Like To Apologise

 

There’s a tinker without an axe to grind –

just a tea chest full of table knives

down Helston way and onto The Lizard,

all the better to nick the gizzard,

he misses arteries but snicks the veins –

spot him from window seats on the train

where an interminable litany intrudes

upon these fascinations - has us glued

to cheap moquette polyurethane foam,

an adhesive of beading sticky sweat

and we’re not even part way there yet -

a hissing classless deadpan monotone

slithers from speakers and drones,

plucked slit wristed, tanpura style,

by a two-fingered woolly mittened

thread-sleeved Stourport dreadnought:

It seems they’d quite like to apologize:

for moving slower up your inclines

than they’d like, for running late,

it’s a lot to ask; there’s a lack of seats

due to pulling two coaches not three,

please give yours up for infirms or elderlies,

unexpected air conditioning malfunction

at Droitwich, that earlier cancellation

mentioned previous, but compensation –

if you search up and click GWR Delay.

While Cornish countryside makes its way

inch by inch, inspector’s sent, greets you

with a surly, ‘All tickets joining at Truro,’

clickety-click, but we’d quite like to glower,

sullen at the backs of seats, ignore

that courtesy, let them punch fresh air,

conjure up streaky rashers of fare flouts

spitting in pans - ticket touts, litter louts,

waiting for a long-delayed day they shout –

‘The Emperor’s got no clothes.’ Point out

quiet lanes, long and winding routes,

from London to The Lizard via Helston Town -

your saw-toothed tinker's heaping mounds

of all slack tongued lip-service he ground.

Sweet Potato

 

Sweet Potato

 

 

There’s an uncollected solitary sweet potato, going off,

with shrivelled skin and soft

centre, front left corner of the otherwise

empty wickerwork vegetable rack, and its eyes

might sprout if they weren’t shut tight.

 

Still at least you thought you wanted it,

which is more than I can say. There’s grit

in every sip of that tea I didn’t make,

a carbon monoxide alarm for carbon monoxide’s sake

and smoke alarms that would sit awake

 

if you’d ever reached up to replace expired batteries

in sleeping policemen. The factories

burn and churn them out – dying is a thriving industry;

and there’s a something symmetry

that I can’t articulate – proclivity and declivity

 

or a loop the loop, where the ends don’t lock.

They’ll convince you – bastards fronting Watchdog,

that bottle tops kill, radon gas leaks undetected,

lock doors, bar windows, shut curtains, stay protected –

but when your number’s up, you’re collected.

Ruby’s

 

Ruby’s

 

 

You make your escape mid-morning –

pictured the carnage you’ll be cleaning before they set to

chopping fruit, several self-composting kilos

for Saturday’s protracted wedding do

and you’ve absolutely refused to go –

picture the longuers clearly: church, people, photographs,

our tune, unnecessarily crap laptop disco –

a couple of speakers, cheap LED glitterballs

watch him hyperfocus on punching that ‘enter’ key.

Oh, darling, save the last dance for me,

no thank you, feet up, football’s on telly –

So, that’s you, Falmouth train,

a bit of bin-digging on the brain,

flicking through yesterday’s paper.

A scorcher – hot enough to boil a halibut’s eyeballs

on the pavement, you’ve sweated over market stalls,

passed on pickled seafood salad,

huffed up Jacob’s Ladder, rooted through charity shops -

nothing doing - until you’re at your final stop –

Ruby’s. ‘All the clothes half price,’ your hawker pledges,

‘Vinyl’s marked down 20%,’ he alleges

and you’re quite adept at flicking dusty racks,

but there’s nothing you feel like humping back

save an old Al Stewart, unusual sleeve, and pretty sure

you’ve ticked that box some years before.

Eventually you chance across four CDs propping

the shelves above, cracked and purporting

to contain semi-playable discs.

You think: ‘What’s this’ – and – ‘Ah, go on, take the risk,

why don’t you?' Remembering that proffered discount,

you approach his bunker all confident bounce.

He glances, sifts, tots it up, checks your face’s pages

and demands full whack – shuffle your feet,

make protest, but he responds, ‘Nah, you’re too cheap’.

Maybe he checked himself, but you don’t really know,

wonder who Ruby is, what she would do

and when you get back, the kitchen floor’s sown

with deconstructed fruit you’ll swab alone.