What I love about birth
is the universal surprise, on the dot, everyday
What I hate about everyday
is The End, the beginning of eclipses.
The Bright Side
Things are so bad
I am reduced to scraping
The outside of the barrel.
And yet, I do not despair.
In the yard there are many
Worse off than myself. (Well, four:
A one-eyed rat
A three-legged cat
A corpse and the lavatory door.)
Worry
Where would we be without worry?
It helps keep the brain occupied.
Doing doesn’t take your mind off things,
I’ve tried.
Worry is God’s gift to the nervous.
Best if kept bottled inside.
I once knew a man who couldn’t care less.
He died.
The Unknown Worrier
Don’t worry, I’ll do it for you
I’m a therapist manqué
Let me be your worry beads
I’ll tell your cares away
Should I chance to sit beside you
In a café or a park
And a cloud is hanging over
Groaning, heavy and dark
You can bet that when it’s time to go
You’ll have nothing on your mind
While I sit in the shadow
Of the cloud you left behind
Don’t worry, I’ll do it for you
Relax, I’ll take the strain
Anxiety is my forte
I’ve got worry on the brain
New Brooms
New brooms sweep clean
Old brooms can’t be fussed
New brooms are mad keen
Old brooms can’t stand dust.
New brooms are young bulls
Can’t wait to get their teeth
Into the kitchen carpet,
Up the stairs and underneath
The fridge and the cooker
Where grease stains won’t dissolve,
With each problem their bristles
Stiffening with resolve.
Old brooms are allergic
To dust and doggy hair
Than raise a whirlwind in the lounge
They would much prefer
To rearrange the particles
With a reassuring sweep,
Then lean against the cupboard wall
For a long and dreamless sleep.
‘Dust is the carpet of the contented’
The motto of ancient brooms
And of the folk who sit contentedly
Waiting, in darkening rooms.
low jinks
today
i will play low jinks,
be commonplace.
will merge,
blend, change
not one jot.
be beige, be –
have, my friend
will fault me not.
couching myself
in low terms
i will understate.
today
i will give the little blue ones a miss,
and see what happens.
Passion
We keep our noses clean, my friend and i,
do what we’re told.
Keep profiles soft and low
as we grow old.
We take up little space, my friend and i,
avoid the town.
Keep our curtains drawn
our voices down.
We live an ordered life, my friend and i,
cause little fuss.
If only everyone
could be like us.
***
Screaming now, he screams, my friend, and i
know what to do.
Have him put away.
(Well wouldn’t you?)
Solarium
i own a solarium
and when it’s cold
i simmer in
artificial gold
from mornings grey
my private sun
smiles down all day
i pity those
whose flesh is white
as bronzed i sleep
alone each night
Dressed for the Occasion
I have enough jackets and trousers
Though shirts I may need to replace
A couple of suits I can oxfam
As they take up far too much space.
One overcoat, one jacket, leather,
One linen suit for summer weather
Hats of course, and a dressing-gown
Should last until the blind comes down.
Getting On
The husk may crack
The chalksticks creak
The brain confused
The pulse is weak
But Time is your own, at least
And that beast, Passion
No longer screams to be fed.
Getting Off
I closed my eyes, held my breath
and tried to lie quite still
Refused to believe that death
applied to me, until
You may get the vote at eighteen, but you’re born with a price on your head
blue sierra
daguerreoscape
echo echo
in some moonfilled canyon
as a rattlesnake
tosses in its sleep
Time to move on
I kick out the fire
and to the ground put my ear
He’s still there
getting nearer year by hear.
The Bountyhunter
who knows my price
closing in.
White bones gleaming like dice
high heel boots
dusty
as sin
My Shadow is but a Shadow of Its Former Self
It was in Kalgoorlie last year, late one afternoon
the sun scorching my back, when, there at my feet
not a silhouette of anthracite, not a steam-rollered
Giacometti, but a gauze veil. A finely pencilled sketch.
I blamed the tinnies and thought no more about it.
But this summer, while jogging in Battersea Park,
I noticed that whenever I sprinted, my shadow fell behind
and I had to stop and wait for it to catch up.
I have also noticed that when the sunblock wears off
so does my shadow. Am I becoming translucent?
At midnight I play statues on the lawn. The moon
sees through me, but gives the cat a familiar to play with.
I fear that summertime when I will keep to the house
and feel my way around darkened rooms.
Dozing in armchairs, I will avoid the bedroom, where,
propped up on pillows and fading, waits my shadow.
Science, where are you?
I started smoking young. The Big C
didn’t scare me. By the time
I was old enough to get it,
Science would have found the cure.
‘Ad astra per angina’ was the
family motto, and thrombosis
an heirloom I didn’t care to inherit.
But I didn’t worry. By the time
I was old enough to face it
St Science would surely have
slain that particular dragon.
Suddenly I’m old enough…
Science, where are you Science?
What have you been doing
all these years? Were you playing
out when you should have been
doing your homework? Daydreaming
in class when you should
have been paying attention?
Have you been wasting your time
and worse still, wasting mine?
When you left school did you
write scr
ipts for ‘Tomorrow’s World’
before being seduced by a starlet
from a soap ad? Lured by the
bright lights of commercialism
did you invent screwtop bottles,
self-adhesive wallpaper, nonstick
pans, chocolate that melts
in the mouth not the hands?
Kingsize fags, tea-leaves in bags
beers, bras, voracious cars,
beans, jeans, washing-machines.
You name it, we buy it.
The Arts I expected nothing from.
Good company when they’re sober
but totally unreliable. But
Science, I expected more from you.
A bit dull perhaps, but steady.
Plodding, but getting there in the end.
Now the end limps into view
and where are you? Cultivating
cosmic pastures new? Biting off
more Space than you can chew?
Science you’re needed here, come down
and stay. I’ve got this funny pain
and it won’t go awa
a
g
g
h
Poem with a Limp
Woke up this morning with a
limp.
Was it from playing
football
In my dreams? Arthrite’s first
arrow?
Polio? Muscular dystrophy? (A bit of
each?)
I staggered around the kitchen spilling
coffee
Before hobbling to the bank for
lire
For the holiday I knew I would not be
taking.
(For Portofino read Stoke
Mandeville.)
Confined to a wheelchair for the
remainder
Of my short and tragic life.
Wheeled
On stage to read my terse, honest
poems
Without a trace of bitterness. ‘How
brave.
And smiling still, despite the
pain.’
Resigned now to a life of quiet
fortitude
I plan the nurses’ audition.
Mid-afternoon
Sees me in the garden, sunning my
limp.
***
It feels a little easier now.
Perhaps a miracle is on its way?
(Lourdes, w11.)
By opening-time the cure is complete.
I rise from my deck-chair:
‘Look, everybody, I can walk, I can walk.’
Right as Rain
Alan’s had his thingies done. You know, down there.
Hurt like hell at first but now he’s fine.
He told us all about it in the bar.
The whole caboodle lasted half an hour.
Tied tightly with a sort of rubber twine
they drop off. Now Alan’s right as rain. You know, down there.
Eighteen months ago he had a scare.
Blood in the pan was the ominous sign.
He told us all about it in the bar.
Unlike women, men don’t really care
to talk about illness, it might undermine
the macho image. Especially when it’s, you know, down there.
Making jokes about the bottom line
he gets them in, four lagers, two bitters and a dry white wine.
Alan’s had this thingies done. You know, down there.
He told us all about it in the bar.
Say ‘Ah!’
It hangs from the ceiling,
legs swinging. Zip
unfastening. My little grape.
Split uvula. Make a wish
and the palate is cleft.
Genetically a near miss.
A hair’s breadth away
from a hare-lip
and thpeaking like thith.
Bits of Me
When people ask: ‘How are you?’
I say, ‘Bits of me are fine.’
And they are. Lots of me I’d take
anywhere. Be proud to show off.
But it’s the bits that can’t be seen
that worry. The boys in the backroom
who never get introduced.
The ones with the Latin names
who grumble about the hours I keep
and bang on the ceiling
when I’m enjoying myself. The overseers.
The smug biders of time.
Over the years our lifestyles
have become incompatible.
We were never really suited
and now I think they want out.
One day, on cue, they’ll down tools.
Then it’s curtains for me. (Washable
plastic on three sides.) Post-op.
Pre-med. The bed nearest the door.
Enter cheerful staff nurse (Irish
preferably), ‘And how are you today?’
(I see red.) Famous last words:
‘Bits of me are fine.’ On cue, dead.
The Wrong Beds
Life is a hospital ward, and the beds we are put in
are the ones we don’t want to be in.
We’d get better sooner if put over by the window.
Or by the radiator, one could suffer easier there.
At night, the impatient soul dreams of faraway places.
The Aegean: all marble and light. Where, upon a beach
as flat as a map, you could bask in the sun like a lizard.
The Pole: where, bathing in darkness, you could watch
the sparks from Hell reflected in a sky of ice. The soul
could be happier anywhere than where it happens to be.
Anywhere but here. We take our medicine daily,
nod politely, and grumble occasionally.
But it is out of our hands. Always the wrong place.
We didn’t make our beds, but we lie in them.
The Health Forecast
Well, it’s been a disappointing day
in most parts, has it not?
So, let’s have a look at tomorrow’s charts
and see what we’ve got.
Let’s start with the head, where tonight
a depression centred over the brain
will lift. Dark clouds move away
and pain will be widespread but light.
Exposed areas around the neck and shoulders
will be cold (if not wearing a vest)
and there may be dandruff on high ground
especially in the west.
Further inland:
Tomorrow will begin with a terrible thirst.
Lungs will be cloudy at first,
in some places for most of the day,
and that fog in the throat
simply won’t go away.
So keep well wrapped up, won’t you?
For central areas the outlook is fairly bright
although the liver seems unsettled
after a heavy night,
and a belt of high pressure, if worn too tight,
may cause discomfort.
Further south it will be mainly dry
although showers are expected in private parts
and winds will be high,
reaching gale force incontinent.
Some thunder.
Around midnight, this heavy front
is expected to move in,
resulting in cyclonic highs
in and around the upper thighs.
Temperatures will rise
and knees may well seize up in the heat.
And as for the feet,
perspiration will be widespread
resulting in a sweaty bedspread.
And the outlook for the weak?
Not as good as for the strong, I’m afraid.
Goodnight.
In Vain
I like liposuction, I’ve had my lipo sucked.
No flab to grab on my abdomen
My buttocks neatly tucked.
Implants in my pectorals, wrinkles all erased
Nosejob and a hairpiece, both eyes doubleglazed.
Zits all zapped by laser, cheekbones smashed and reset.
But sadly, my days are numbered,
I’m up to my ears…
Remember how they used to stick out?… in debt.
(For in brackets here I’ll mention
A certain glandular extension)
Penile, in fact, which increased my libido
Though senile I act like a beast
And the need, oh the greed,
Oh those nights of seedless passion!
Which will doubtless explain
The cardiovascular pain
And three-way bypass, alas, in vain.
Wearing pyjamas designed by Armani
A perfect body waiting to die.
Bewigged, butchered and bewildered
Am I,
Am I,
Am I.
THE ELEMENTS
Oxygen
I am the very air
you breathe
Your first
and last
breath
I welcomed you
at birth
Shall bid
farewell
at death
I am the Kiss of Life
Its ebb and flow
With your last gasp
You will call my name:
‘o o o o o o o o’