Should’ve known better than to
Check with her mate whether
She’s decked out for all weather,
Whatever, checkmate. Pilates on a plate,
It’s a palaver but the activewear’s finally on:
Leggings, Asics, hair done in a bun
Standard attire so who’s she running from?
Or where’s she running to?
Not a clue, boo.
Keeps rubbing her eyes; no dove, no coo,
No clue why she cries tears dry as jasmine rice,
Or why she relies on building
Sleepy sand castles for eyelash dwelling lice.
Hides the bright lights, and
Exfoliates the bad dreams without cream,
Respirates a yawn,
I’m torn between attempting to ignore
Or submitting to my own inevitable yawn.
It’s incredible, the hacking yakking pinning us in
Pin the tail on the gossip,
She’s spilling sloppy truths
So now’s the time to stop it
Glottal-stop her epiglottis cos
She’s both sides of the conversation:
Little Miss Armrest-hog Ophelia
Opening cans of opinions
Cos she can’t imagine ever breaking
Through a Velux glass ceiling
When she’s as fresh faced as Rashford,
But can’t afford to be rash…
Yet she’s so opinionated and brash,
Patience meet your match
Fucking definition of a verbal sweat rash.
Tag: writing
June 13th Commuter
Dear Doctor Eggman with
The approximate egghead
All shiny with sweat and snail glue spread,
Almost perfectly round,
Who needed his dough? Who shaped his bread?
Got the millet grain beard, rust on the skillet.
He’s silly & willingly wearing
Skipping rope loops looped over his head,
Chunky bucket handle Headphones
Would drag him down to the depths.
Embedded his ears in ill-fitting earphones
Caresses and fusses with his hi-tech smartphone
Ring on his finger implies a sweet moan
But his hunched over posture cries leave me alone…
To atone for rocking a tweed jacket on this sunny day,
Fucking sack it off, just pack it away
I’m getting heat stroke and we’re going the same way,
Can’t look away from the soft sweat stains
On his picnic blanket shirt,
The one tetrised with squares
Careful yogi don’t get jokey
Cos I don’t think this Pudsey
Can handle a real bear.
Pickernick shirt,
Pick n mix dirt skirting cuticles like fur
Couldn’t be further from the cubicle
Heading for the sofa, which he clearly prefers.
Pre-prepped his crepes,
Stage managing each step
So his brown leather boots boast scuff marks on purpose.
Purportedly supportive of bovine extortion
And the supple contortion of the little wean’s skin…
He looks up at me and gives me a frown
Watches as I jot down:
How now male sow?
Can’t we Kowtow this row?
Cos I’m allowed to wow crowds
With this crown of highbrow know-how
Despite having a head crowded by clouds.
March 22nd Commuter
Fresh press the chinos,
They’re so benignly beige,
Please ignore his cover
And start flipping each page,
Pays to be patient
Says the doctor to the saint,
But staying so latent?
Well, that just comes with age – like,
Sandpaper stubble subbed in for soft skin
Or clothes in the dryer instead of hanging in the wind.
Rescind the winding whines of wheedling strife
Cos the logo on his backpack promises
A ‘unique concept for a highly active life’
Living the Hi-Life, ain’t got no high tops –
Pops rocking reeboks in titanium white,
And yeah they look nice, but I wonder
What they’d smell like if I took a peek inside?
Let’s just take a step back and say
‘The thought alone will suffice’.
Nice, crisp shirt, not too loose, not too tight
Covered in white dots and buttoned right to the top,
Cos when his fingers start fumbling
You know they never stop.
Feet crossed but legs not; dozing, posing
Specs on his nosey, strung up with white string
Which composes his clothesies,
Cagoule, cap and all.
March 3rd Commuter
Switch on the lenses to see who’s inside
Looks like blue irises in watery eyes
Ebbing and flowing but just can’t cry,
Sad and aimless, skittering around,
Overwhelmed from the top of the ceiling
To the bottom of the ground,
Just sitting around clasping the past in her lap,
Plumbing the denim depths of stonewashed shores,
Should head abroad for that sunshine selfie gloat
So migrating south in her goose down coat
Chewing the bread crumbs laying on the lay lines,
Blue line’s delayed by demands for overpaid overtime,
We’re all statues behind the yellow finish line,
Expecting to be taken home in good time
But this time it’s taking a toll,
Need to refreeze the Iceland ice-cream roll
Boxed up in the bag behind her legs.
What did you expect?
She’s a bag for life carrying a bag for life –
Ring on her finger, she’s been bagged for life
As someone’s wife, what a life, life of Riley
Clothes so tidy and her mouth is so tiny,
It barely breaks the surface tension of her face,
Misplaced, out of date, flick the clipper
And watch the cheeks sag
As the skipper goes down with her ship
Someone slipped her a menthol filter tip.
Cigarette wrinkles spiral round her lips,
Like a centrifugal baccy rind beat into her hide
Go grab the drawstring and now pull it tight,
Slip the slimline inside; puff, puff,
Cough cough, oh shit she’s died.
March 2nd CommuterÂ
Cockblock the King’s Rock, cos she’s
Rocking a baggy pink beanie, slumping
Like a Slowpoke that feels kinda sleepy.
Tuck in the blonde hair
Get it all up under there,
Goldilocks using travelcards to escape those three bears:
Ménursa trois with the wholegrain grains,
Organic porridge to start the day,
Tuck it away, slurp it up, she’s got the curves
That make commuters look up,
Stood up in the carriage in those
Kitten killer heels, a suede covered marriage
Between a kitty and killer deals.
Relax, watch her balancing act,
She’s not holding on cos her phone is switched on –
Eye of pig and beak of angry bird,
Call it a 21st century witches coven.
Covered the top now onto the bottom,
Skinny black jeans swinging in the northern line breeze,
Puff it, I’m wheezing, should pack it in,
But I’m packing fascination for her
Maroon puffa jacket,
She’s looks like grapes in bubble wrap
And I wanna unwrap it.
Asked what’s in the package
Packed into the burnt copper rucksack
Slapped onto to her back,
Just like a donkeys pack
But it slumps to one side
And inside what kinda mysteries might it hide?
Close your eyes, spread your mind,
Shit this is her stop, but it isn’t mine,
As she wanders by, under my breath
I whisper ‘Goodbye’ and without breaking step
She exits the train with a hint of a smile.
March 1st Commuter
Spectacularly oversized specs circumvent
The circles of each iris in the middle of her eyes
Colours in a cage, focusing the light.
A slight disinterest glides behind each lens,
Skating, skirting, transforms the world
Like an oyster with dirt in.
Deidre Barlow glasses perched on a nose,
Wide, curvaceous, aerodynamically low,
Slipping the slipstream through the fake fur on her coat,
A fluffy rim on the hood could be misunderstood
As a sensational political statement,
By the fashion police on the streets of the hood.
Pull them knee high socks up
Before they fall down and
Expose the brown skin forged from
The red clay deep underground.
Adam’s rib, deep fried;
Ted Baker bag, oversized;
Underused, so improvise
A fulfilling filling for its inside.
Crimson braids hang and sway,
Watch the sexy serpents play
I feel like Barry White on Whacking Day,
Whacks in her earbuds and then hits play
Her nodding head shrinking
As the train drifts away.
February 27th Commuter
I broke my wrist last week, so haven’t really been corpus mentus on the commuter poetry front.
Back now though:
Outer space backpack, supernova shoulder strap
Yellow-green explosions painting her with sassafras
Secrets of the universe asking for a piggy back.
Black hole seeks like soul
For fun times and ‘mo,
Must enjoy watching me swallowing your goals.
Holes in her black jeans,
Acutely angular Wranglers hanging
Knock-kneed at the knee seams
Obtusely obscene, if you know what I mean.
Sitting in a coat the colour of old cream,
Faux fur from a gopher that drowned in a stream
Hands in the pockets of a shabby polar bear
That’s sprawled out on the seat.
Umbrella at her feet, Cinderella at the door
Picking out the pumpkins she wants to take to court,
Sporting New Balance bought fresh from the store,
Shiny from the rain drops falling outdoors.
Precipitation precipitates her choice of threads of course,
Can’t prepare, laissez-faire,
Tries to balance a blank stare
Atop those skipping stone cheeks,
Flat, round and pallid, like you’d find at the beach
But always out of reach, like an acne cream
For the marks on her cheeks.
Adolescent hieroglyphics fade over time
Once goaded by rhymes,
Childlike innocence bang out of line.
P’raps that’s why
Her bangs hang over her ears:
All the better not to hear you with my dear –
But pull back the fringe, so she can see me
Seeing her hurt, seeing her pain.
Thought the tears on her cheeks
Were nothing more than rain.
February 15th Commuter
I’ll start from the top and I will not stop
Until I’ve joined all the dots,
I’m the cammomile, she’s the chicken pox
Rockin Minnie Mouse hair, two mouse ear
Dollops plopped, tied up in forget-me-nots.
Great Scott, doc brown gonna hang around
Neck first from the necklace
Hanging round her neck first,
Pepsi Perfect thirstin, doors open: I’m first in.
Track the train back to the present at speeds break neck.
Broad nose and soft cheeks making me strain my neck.
Thinking of asking if I can bask in
This sassy, ashy lassie’s action,
Bank on me bringing the baskin and robbins,
The Moses basket and Christopher Robin.
Step back, I get ahead of myself, lemme
Selfishly shelve all of my magic spells
And fairy dust, plus her socks so sparkly
Like sparkin’ angel dust on the foil,
10 joints for Slytherin, Crabbe bought em from Goyle.
Victoria line shuffling down the coil, pitch black view
Still better than the PVA and post-it’s that spoil my cubicle’s view.
You too? Should’ve checked, but she
Wearing cheques, red and blue,
Purple lippy on the side, morning prep.
What did she expect?
Besides short shorts exposing the stretch marks on her legs?
I’m not lying, but she a real girl,
So I would not expect any less,
Tell you the truth, I give her mad respect
For sharing two calves that I wanna caress,
But keep my cards close to my chest
Cos I’m contactless
Believe me, I’m under no duress,
I just think that she’s blessed.
14th February Commuter
Lemme segway a sec, cos I’ve totally pegged
This hen-pecked, pen-heckled,
Old speckled hen sipper,
Cackling, old, tapas tipple tipper,
Real deal, Big Dipper zipper ripper.
Claptrap trapping, insensitive sentence clipper,
Yom Kippur for the mansplaining leg spreader,
Straying in boots made of real leather,
Cowskin soles, maturing his cheddar,
Pray for the weather, air miles collector
Fucking springtime Alpine ski slope sledder,
Regretting greeting Greta at the regatta,
Shoulda sat with them legs together, forever.
Forget her genial gaze, bet she’s older than a genie’s age,
Or older than the jeans in which Norma Jeane lays.
Got beads on his wrist,
Polished mahogany shackles carved out of sticks
Probably by someone who lives in the sticks
Turning these tricks, I hope that it sticks
Custom fitted for the rich, or for
Kitsch – open bracket,
bracelet wearing, oversharing, uncaring
close bracket – dicks.
Seems to forget exactly where it is that he is,
There’s strictly no sound on the underground
But it abounds when a throaty guffaw flags up his flaws
So take your best pick from the penny pick n mix:
Unbuttoned shirt fluttering under a North Face fleece zip?
Or money not in a wallet but held in a clip?
Words slurred by a permanent lisp?
The blue blood glues shut his lips,
That’s just how it is.
9th February Commuter
Mercy, mercy me! God damn!
I do declare those are working man’s hands,
Candidly handling an empty Fanta can
Recanting financial incantations
Using the fingers on each hand.
Each one fat as a rustic bread roll,
Stocky white van men, naturally bald,
But unnaturally bold when it comes to
Cigarettes that have to be rolled.
Red light, Amber leaf, soon to be green teeth.
Fiddles with a filter, fulfilling the filler to
Throw himself off kilter.
Head rush, heart rush
Maybe enough to guilt her into uncompacting their crush?
Not likely after a puff, puff, puff, but still,
That’s the stuff; off the cuff links to
Thoughts of other stuff –
Turn it up, that thing that makes him grin:
Could be the podcast in his ear,
Or memories from a different year,
Like when he made that bully shed those tears,
Exchanged overbearing fears for underwhelming peers.
No fear, not hurting, coat bought from Burtons,
Same dull shade as his tobacco faded curtains.
Time to curtail and close these curtains,
Hard to tell but I’m certain that he’s hurtin’
Cos when the grin fades, the wrinkles upstage
And I can’t gauge his age
But fears allayed, come the end of the month,
He’ll get paid his wage
And can finally afford another can of
Fruit flavoured lemonade.
Stories On The Sofa 