‘Just do me a favour,’ he said
‘Check over my figures –
Something just won’t add up.’
I fix it
in three hours
and press my lips together.
My smile is as convincing as his
Toilet-bowl white teeth
Mashing together
Falling over his tongue
As he races to affix it to
A board member’s behind.

Bored
Is who I am now
It’s embedded in my genes
Maybe if I tried
I could read this report in Latin
But instead I make notes in shorthand
A revered ancient language.

‘Whose report is this?’ ejaculates Mr Board.
‘Outstanding!’
A nervous brown tongue flicks over
Those toilet-bowl teeth
I am silent.
‘It’s mine,’ he says.
Mr Board turns to me –
‘Just do me a favour’
‘Get that in the notes,’ he says.
I press my lips together.

In the doctor’s surgery
My lips are parted
For the third time this month
In his endless quest to fix my insides
By gently chipping away at them.
I hand him the chisel,
but he looks up, annoyed.
‘Just do me a favour,’ he says
‘And try to relax.’

At home
I try to relax
but the phone keeps ringing.
My mother is calling
to check that I still cook her recipes.
He asks: ‘do we know what we are having for tea?’
We do not.
He comes behind me
and links his arms around my waist
face in my hair.
He says
‘Just do me a favour.’

An unusually hot afternoon in mid- April. We are in the garden, amusing ourselves in companionable quiet. You are happiest with the earth, bedding fragrant French lavender into its new home. You work carefully, tucking the roots gently into the soil with your bare hands, contentedly sighing every now and again. I sit reading nearby, cocooned in the oval chair with its thick cream cushions. My dress is the colour of clementines, and glows in the hot golden sun. The pages of my book breathe on the breeze and I slip in and out of the words; one moment Nietzsche and the cries of the neighbours’ baby the next. Its wails rent the air suddenly, desperately, and my heart jolts. I listen instinctively, waiting for it to be soothed. The hush comes quickly, in soft Italian murmurs that my ears don’t understand. Softly, softly, lullaby, hush my love, you need not cry.

Where are you going with this?
Your passion is caught in your beard
and she holds her breath,
you might just take it from her.

She is crushing on you:
it is easy to do.
Hungry for the stars
and storminess and the pub at 2am,
she will man your barricade.

Having told her what it is,
say the word.

He plays by his own tune, an inventor,
investor in himself.
To others he might seem like one at odds with the world,
but there are no odds in his world,
nothing to gamble or lose.

He is the solo player of his own team,
motivator, multiplayer,
bricklayer of his own foundation.
The harmonies of his life are rich and silent
scorching the ears of those that hear.

He sits alone but surrounded,
a thinker,
tinker of his craft,
weaving threads of agéd phrases,
polished relics, softening the edges.

He listens like a broken watch waiting for the minute,
the second,
but he is always second to those who shout or howl or cry.

A river runs through him.
Gushing the tide of humanity flows fast,
shaping those around him,
voicelessly moulding us into his works of art.

Today, I shat very well without noise and easily.
I shat thinking about you, and to be honest, I’m not ashamed anymore.
(Understand this: pretty boys also shit)
To think about intestines you have to understand that the blue ass of a Russian smells the same as a beautiful Peruvian soldier’s ass.
I get drunk and think about my stomach’s clay.
Sunsets.
Then, I realize an overwhelming truth:
Each morning I shit my heart out in pieces.

She wore the biggest sunglasses you’ve seen,
ever.

No sunshine in sight but that didn’t deter her,
never.

She thought the tinted lenses made her look smart,
clever.

Shrouded in mystery,
a woman with no history, she would wear her Raybans forever,
whatever the weather.

The lights are on
and I am home,
unfortunately.

There’s a
rap tap
knock knock:
someone.

Outside shines night
and birds sing silence.
The moment grows
and I cower.

Anger fills
and fuels the house.
Violence follows
like an erupting volcano.

Children don’t work like adults.
We have less to fear;
but ours is double concentrated.

There’s a
smick smack
crick crack:
was someone.

The lights are on
but I’m not home,
hopefully.

Here, is not there
nor anywhere
but here in
the sounds of the moment
we are here in.
Yet, here is also an echo
of a moment before
when here was not here
but there waiting
to be discovered by us
and defined in the borders
of our memories
as here, where
we heard the birds in the sky.
Here, is only here
to be heard by us.
For others to hear here
would make it there to us once more.

A billion years from now
or a billion billion
will these words resound
will these ancient feet print
Could it be that
Ridley Scott’s Alien exists
will this make sense and how
a billion years past
or a billion billion
will we be back now
or stuck in hell. What
will be remembered
The Duellists or (the) Duel?

I have no idea why, but I thought the Mona Lisa would taste better.

“For those
that have been asking,”
she announced
for all of Facebook
to read or ignore.
“My BMI has
dropped from 26
to 22.1.”

I’m suspicious
that anyone
even asked.
And if they did,
surely she could have
told them directly.

“It’s the look in their eyes when we hit them, people and animals, that bothers me most,” the engineer said.

I don’t miss those conversations with engineers and conductors about the horrors of their jobs.

I don’t miss the three-hour delays for suicides, accompanied by fists pounding on windows when passengers realized they would not make graduations, weddings, and job interviews.

I don’t miss the café car attendant, who sang over the intercom in a shrill voice his invitation to the café car.

I don’t miss the cat lady, who claimed she kept her meowing cat zipped in her jacket for emotional support.

I don’t miss passengers with croup-sounding coughs asking to borrow my phone.

I don’t miss the sunburned faces and liquor-smelling belches of people boarding after a day at the horse races.

I don’t miss the nosy tax guy, who seemed to take pleasure in hearing about our pay cuts and layoffs during the Great Recession.

I don’t miss those things on 785 northbound.

But I miss the happy-go-lucky dog, that for years ran full speed alongside us every day at the same place and time, like clockwork, trying to keep up with our train.

I wish I could stop missing that dog, and wondering about the look the engineer last saw in its eyes.

a black lab mix, she
sat next to me
on the front seat
of my truck.

Before I hit the gas
when the light
turned green,
I always said —
here we go now —
so Bela would be ready.

And damn it
if I didn’t say
the same thing
when the vet came
to give her the needle.

You told me that all love goes to die at Leidseplein.
Back when your face was on mine,
your curled hair around my harsh fingers.

In that anti-squat, full of damp.
Our gas heaters of perpetual mourning.
where our life was filled with promises, overseas disasters and Albert Heijn carrier bags.

So this is my goodbye to you.
Here, by the edge of Leidseplein,
Where the terse policemen breathalyse drunken tourists.

The cold lamps swing blindly from the dead trees.
And I wait willingly despite it all,
to watch you move off sweetly into the world.

Monday‘s journey to work was proving to be even slower than usual. Gavin sighed, gripping the steering wheel in both hands as he inched along in the traffic queue. He stared at the commuters on foot who passed him in the opposite direction, willing one of them to look up and smile – anything to break the monotony. None did.

It was then that he saw it. The dead fox was sprawled across the pavement in a comedic pose; legs akimbo, gore spattered across the white fur of its belly, tongue lolling. Passersby stopped and stared, confused, before giving it a wide berth.

The woman on her phone saw nothing, until too late. She shot one leg into the air as if dancing the Can-can and span on the toe of her stiletto, narrowly avoiding landing in the oncoming traffic. Gavin caught a glimpse of red underwear and smiled as she met his gaze.

Like a secret.

My lips, sealed, will shroud you in darkness.

Sometimes you’ll move to remind me you’re there

warm tremors on my cheek and tongue.

Sometimes you’ll sleep for months

curled up in the cold corners of my thoughts.

Sometimes you’ll grow and choke me

like a wild thing.

Always I’ll want to spit you out.

The barman’s fat, hairy arse crack opened itself up nicely, poking free from the top of the belted, faded denim.

Bent over, big blue catering roll in hand, the freshly spilled Guinness was mopped up professionally and painlessly by the workman-like barman.

Double apologies ensued between the regular, once brimming cup holder and slightly embarrassed, less regular and younger glass nudger.

A microclimatic dramedy of conflict, revealing sexual body parts, reconciliation and resolution. Early January post Xmas perils are unavoidable but rarely navigated so beautifully.

Making up and moving on… with all of us having a little less black stuff in our vessel and the floor a little more stained than it was before.

Before the first pitch of the game, Savannah asks Nathan whether he’s ever been in love. Mouth full, he shakes his head. Savannah delicately bites into her quesadilla, ponders for a few moments, and decides she’d much rather date somebody who’s never been in love than someone who has.

“He wasn’t an ugly duckling at all. He was an ugly swan!”

It’s so quiet,
So still,
So stationary,
You could hear a pen drop.

You died and Facetimed me from Hell.
It’s not so bad, you said. Heat is included in the cost of rent.
That’s nice, I said. One less bill to worry about.
Ravioli is the national food, you tell me.
What kind? I ask. I prefer spinach.
Spinach, you smile. You know it’s my favourite.
So you’re okay? I wonder.
The view from my window is the world on fire but my apartment is warm and I can eat pasta all day. The devil loves carbs.
I’m okay, you tell me, and suddenly I remember you’re gone.

The thing I really like about my cardigan
Without a shadow of a doubt
Is you can’t accidentally put it on
Inside out

Unlike a jumper

The woman sitting opposite me is sobbing and I didn’t even notice for the first half of my journey. Hunched over her phone she’s in a text conversation with someone and, while she waits for a reply, she dabs her nose with damp tissue and absently wipes tears from her cheeks.

The other passengers in the carriage are staring everywhere but at her.

*

I move forward, gently patting her knee and she looks up at me with dark ringed, bloodshot eyes. I offer an expression that says, ‘I don’t know what the problem is but it’ll be ok.’ She half smiles as I hand over the tissues I’ve managed to pull from the bottom of my bag. She mouths ‘Thank you’, before returning to her phone.

*

I move forward and rest my hand on her knee but she flinches and shoots me a look that shouts, ‘What the fuck are you doing?’. I snatch my hand back as she looks to the people around us for help but they’re all cocooned in their own private worlds. I smile awkwardly, trying my best not to look like a sex offender and hold out the tissues I’ve retrieve from my bag as a peace offering. She glares at them and leaves my hand hanging in the space between us. The train carriage closes in around me.

For the remainder of the journey she types furiously on her phone. At one point she tilts the back of her phone up towards me to take my picture. I’m fairly sure I’m now the topic of conversation on social media.

*

I think about tapping her knee to get her attention. I could catch her eye and smile, maybe tell her that it will be ok. I could give her the packet of tissues from the bottom of my bag and ask if there’s anything I can do. I do none of it. Social acceptance forces me to do nothing and, along with everyone else in the train carriage, I hope that she gets off soon because feigning ignorance is harder to maintain on the longer journeys.

I want

CAKE!

More than

a peach

bottom;

plan forgotten;

It’s all behind me now.