Halfway out
mauve porch
some sun decides
to join the party
bins are emptied
rain wet ramp,
hick brick Ha-ha
under tree detritus.
Here
Jackson Pollack
Frolicked once.
In the dry, damp dust,
scattered with cinnamon twigs,
silver Simeon stones,
and missionary weeds,
A mandrake sighs.
spent
Reading, reading,
reading
my back pages
Wincing & chuckling;
embarrassed & confused,
dazed & amused.
Impertinent little jerk
Shaking a dead man’s geraniums.
I am the guy who
wrote this shit
Am
Cheroot smoke
plumes and wisps
Effigy, Eulogy, Ecstasy…
Bingo!
In Thames Ditton
A drowned kitten
In your own backyard.
Smartphone spews
Headjuice on Muesli.
Sid crows, demi-dawn, cool night breeze folds,
falls from fan.
Remnants remain: crusted, polythene grass;
stale tobacco;
grand damned poems;
the truce is over, the murder is resumed.
Back to where it all began, square one squared,
one more dance, duplicated dalliance.
So the day is done. The same old same old
Step out hand in hand in
Vellum gloves
Starving
savaged anchovy,
ravaged dry
baguette,
tore off a sockful,
wrapped up shredded limb
A bloodless coup d’ pan complete…
till later:
Part-sated, basking in its modest cranny,
the predator lowers, rests ruminant,
still wanting, just waiting, inhaling, whittling.
The deep, odd, shock of it hit me in the sun
On the shed path, marooned on a concrete crack
Freed up took in the scene, shocked, turned;
Trundled, older, balder, back up the ramp
Freewheeled, calmer, silent, down the ramp
Came to rest beside the stable table,
Tossed my hair (singular) in the blue breeze
And wiped the puss from Barney’s weeping souls.
The moo-cows are gone home to roast
No more mutinous idiots barge in
Decide to play this game of life to win
the whisper of the sea
around the balustrade
the whistle of the sea
cast me in this mystery?
this is the
start of history
a whisper of the sea,
around the balustrade.
Melancholy
Flea
Melancholy
Knee,
Woe is me,
Anatomy
Giant flea,
Hook
Swatted whopper,
splattered it,
squashed it
on
scruff, ruff
with my giant thumb,
shadow of its former self,
a bloody, sticky mess.
Al Boley
fills gas
lamp mantle
a tin, eerie
bacolite mantle,
Woodbine romance
Shall we dance?
Syncopated Agatha;
Anglepoise, equipose,
Lachrymose quaques.
Crackle and ivory,
drum brush, Dapper Dan,
tuxedo, savoy, suave, class, pure class, lush…
rubber corsets on flaccid flappers,
inner tube condoms,
PJ Perelman, art deco, echo chamber
commemorations, abdications, league of nations,
pylon poets, silver screens, Teruel,
Abyssinia, King Zog, King Kong,
concierge, demi-urge, debutantes, ants-in-pants…
Popular Fronts, Fascist Cunts, Micky Mouse,
The uniformed doorman at the Picture House
Primo Carnero, Bonnie, Clyde, Lassie
Armstrong Siddeley, broken chassis
Spikes, louses, blouses, dames in trousers
Pathe Newsreels, nudists, sandalled Buddhists,
Caddying for Tony Locke, spats, Schneider Trophy
No nightingales in Berkeley Square, just martingales,
We’ll begin at midnight
When you have time you have liberty
Apollinaire
Noon & Nixpence
Meagre sleep
in tranceful, graceles woe,
pursued by evil minded lambs,
surrounded by the hurt and hapless.
These things I sink below,
subsumed in dread.
This is the blue blue blues:
heavy fug,
turn world upside down,
shake it down.
dandruff and wonga sprinkle
earth skin, cluster and choke.
Bad air day.
Solace: not alone.
United we sit,
divided we lie.
Grimbeau 