Tag: londonunderground

May 25th Commuter

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Hispanic scouser Ian Beale
Dressed in camouflage gear sun bleached teal
Cowers in an ill fitting padded jacket
Giving ample cover to
Hanging eyes, drawn on hands and
Quarter gram baccy packets.
Army cap is pulled on tight, a plant pot
Blooming underground sounds booming
Ears melt like waxy candles under a pyroclastic flow
Of dry air and dead winds,
Whipping past a snotty, blocked up nose.
Call the midlife crisis,
It’s a flag of surrender when the tissue blows.

Short black thistles
Dabbed on stucco by
Paint brush bristles
Stitched of whistling reeds,
And the Midas rumours murmur,
Clog and crystallise in
Silken rivulets of silty lies.
A man made of wet sand,
Carved from wood with tatty, leather hands.
Full moon bags reflect beneath tired, watery eyes,
Pallid irises flicker just like flies
Under hedgerow brows,
A pair of graying gorse bush clouds.

He rises grabbing an orange Sainsbury’s bag tightly,
Rheumy eyes flighty, a burden not carried lightly
But a pilgrimage he must make nightly,
Wake up that puggish stare and
Approach the chiller buzzing brightly,
The cool glow beckons him over impolitely
Shelves are bare, stock is low
Therein lies the rub, so choose wisely,
Snatch that meal deal:
Deep fill sarnie, grapes and iced tea
Grab the carpenter’s cup oh so nicely.

23rd May Commuter

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That’s a mighty big schweppe lad;
With your upright sitting posture,
And your hands clasped in lap,
The product smothered beetles
Wriggle in your tree sap,
You’re twiggy resin,
Wearing a birds nest for a cap.
Sore red spots, ink dot gumdrops,
Hand holds for daredevils and rock climbers
Potted plants for office two timers
Greasy with lacquer, teak soaked in oil
Varnish the skin before it bubbles and boils.
Tie it together with a skipping rope beard
Arching from ear to ear, a keratin grin,
Patchy muffler, a scruffy neck warmer,
Nobody puts hindsight into the corner,
No they team it with pristine white jeans,
Bright and blazing; eyesight blinded, fading.
A white hot sunset in snowy cotton threads,
An un-ironed heat haze over khaki coloured treads.
Suddenly he jumps up, gives his seat up
To a young woman with a smile and wink,
Zips up his top to hide the
Mustard splashed t-shirt, pastel pink
The sort of stain you should soak in the sink.

20th May Commuter

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Pencilled on eyebrows rage against the dying light,
Shellac nails and a bun pulled tight;
Taut features, smooth yet stressed,
A slack shirt freshly pressed.
Yet Somewhere
Beneath the fake leather coat, a beetle black cloak;
Beneath The shiny metallic zips, fools gold for pouting lips;
Beneath the glued on nails, as thick and dark as credit cards
Something changes.
But I don’t know what.
Hands hang from sleeves, crisp and cracked as autumn leaves,
Ready to brown and shatter,
A road map of wrinkles clad hands in
Gloves of age, jaundice yellow, a fading, sun stained page.
The golden tint of nicotine daubs her in
Turners soft hazy hues;
Turns her face orange, keeps her veins blue,
And twirling infusions of perfume linger on
Longer after her stop, long after she’s gone.

18th May Commuter

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His greasy green coat glistens like the skin of a wet reptile,
A slippy, gangrenous bath tile,
Tangy as a venus flytrap’s saliva
Sharp as limes, stuck in the mud
Smoking sativa, eyes rosy with bud,
Slumped on the back shelf,
Puffy tunnels lined with filo gargoyles
And melting crenelations. Floating here and there
Lost en route from station to station,
Shifty as twilight, a golden hour caught
In a cat’s eyes at night –
Use your walnuts to polish them bright.
Skipping down, I’ll go out on a limb
And call that skinny moustache a scuff mark on his chinny chin chin,
Flickering like train tracks,
Skittering ripped bin bags in the winny wind wind.
As above, sew below, the ripped
Knee holes blink open and find that they’re blind
Thanks to each awkward shuffle of a restless behind.

May 13th Commuter

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Black leather, black jacket, black tee
Adidas stripes, one two three
Stonewash skinny jeans
Sprayed on denim graffiti.
She got a horse shoe nose ring,
Lucky piece of cheap bling
Hanging over the door to her soul,
An open shut case
A tightly pursed mouth hole,
Telling me the whole tale
One that’s stale as bread
Crisper than the pony tail
Pulling back her head
Now nodding along
To something that she read.
Now standing up
Minding where she tread.
Now walking off
Watch the oil slick spread.

May 8th Commuter

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Courtier curls, raven black,
Flap around a thick stump of neck
Home of hot air, sweet breeze uplifting,
Treading on words like sand sinking under a
Caramel complexion stained by tea,
Mapped onto heavy set features.
A proud eagle beak nose soars above the shadow of a beard far below,
Imperiously jutting, slicing through air, cutting,
Broken by a ripple of lips, fat as fish breaking the surface
To glug the inhale exhale of fresh air,
Sharp hair, twilight skin softened by the
Sparkle of a vanish white tee, prisitine, bare.
He grasps a plastic mac in his lap
Budding like a flower made of bin bags
Sodden with sky sap
Drizzling over arm hair sharp as gorse
The sort that tangles and wrangles the
Cloudy sheep whose cotton clads the skin beneath.

May 6th Commuter

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I’ve started writing little ditties about the people who sit opposite me on my commute home. They’ll mostly appear under the ‘Commuter Poetry’ link  in the top menu.

Cheque shirt, check mate;
Empty eyed matey checking his phone
Double-thumbed like no-one’s home.
Rimless glasses half full of glare
Half sagging bags beneath the saucer stare.
Hair as grey as a soft ash fall,
Ebbing over forehead creases,
One, two, three, four
Resting gently on eyebrows
That sit heavy as bracken on a forest floor.
One on top of the other like undeliverable mail,
Or the pinstripe of geological strata,
Years etched into yellowed skin,
Slack like yesterday’s paper, faded glyphs
Hidden amongst the kaleidoscopic noir of
This mornings stubble.
Hanky handed from palm into pocket
Need to save that for later,
As over the shoulder, pop goes the blazer.