Eight
Sea bass had
lids low: fog
walls swell in.
put feet up…
Wear wooly hat
proud as trout.
rest a while.
Smoke gerunds
beforehand.
Still skirting the zone,
peeping over picket
fencing the pastures
of plenty beyond.
Thick lush grass
leaning and sworling
under weathering:
copious
chlorophyll
good goodness.
grazeworthy.
![[Kidwelly Castle, Carmarthen, Wales] (LOC)](https://i0.wp.com/farm3.static.flickr.com/2584/3751646063_55b3de42a2.jpg "[Kidwelly Castle, Carmarthen, Wales] (LOC)")
Seven-thirty, my life:
cider and ashtray gob, pee (an ocean).
Put the kettle on; spill, make and drink a
glass of mud. Bowel creaks and groans,
there is a hog on the roof…
now above and emptied, dig out the day
to come from the old bog road.
Could have been a toad in another life.
Maybe a camel.
Bactrian of course. Yes, that’s it!
Plonked beside the sphinx waiting for a ride.
Better than Buddy on old Barry beach,
freezing in his duffel coat.
Fires behind windcheaters,
they eat ready-made drumsticks;
glower and growl when approached with a view to a sell.
Neddy gets a toffee apple and pukes on a sandcastle ruin.
Conway not, Kidwelly more likely.
Outside toilets on the fourth floor
always a hazard to the uninitiated
The galley is a mess: the Cook’s portholes,
open, abandoned, admit the squalid
Seaspray.
‘Keel haul that Boson, Master Bates, cocking a snook again!’
Karmic three times before the gloaming
Sixbell.
Cross word addiction seeks crucifiction.
Cryptic agnostic pursues persecution.
Here comes the window cleaner in a towel.
So, splice the main brace, Mr Hands, the wind howls
the sea is incandescent maroon green,
a kraken’s wake can be seen astern.
Just there beside the gherkins.
Looks like a job for the Kropotkins.
Pinball and Dickens, it will rain soon: the window will be shut.
Our hero is unwashable.
His father done bad investments.
Cold uncle with the sneery clerk do not help.
What is worse is that is he must go
faraway from this familiar terror
work for Squeers and dwell in his world.
Back in London the dirty oiks cheered him
on his way and gave him a letter.
he did not read it, forgot it.
We worry about him.
He drops the letter, retrieves it from the carriage floor
and reads:
‘…you can come at night. My spilling has gone with my wallies. Pops.’
Grimbeau 