Cracks

For a year now

I’ve only gone infrequent in the dark

to that old, cold house

shushing the alarm

and the car door

going to the unread books

in each room

fifteen pages and a Tesco receipt

twenty and a ticket

for the Prague Metro

or not so much as a crack in the spine

 

There’s a new crack now

a finger’s width

the length of the bay window

A crack to add to the rats’ blood

sniffed into the corner of the room

the fag burnt carpet

pulled up by the rabbit

and the splintered door that saw to

my metacarpal that time

she woke me as I slept downstairs

 

fluffy dogs lie waiting

for owners who don’t come

photos in vigil

 

You had those carpets laid

painted the walls

Dug up the garden for potatoes

The garden

for a wider drive

 

I spent, what, 2, 3 paltry

hours peeling paper in cheese knife strips

leaving striations in the plaster

of that unheatable study

I insisted on

and barely worked in in two years

 

Two different dreams

neither to be

 

I don’t know anybody will ever know

or believe

how hard I had to try

for it to come to such

a holy mess

Too Late

and so it was I ceded to a better man

(was he that?)

an older man

No Byron

nor even an Arthur C Clarke

Why did I never visit you

in Brussels?

why didn’t I do

any of the things I didn’t do

before it was too late?

If I knew

I would tell you

and no one else

and feel the better for it

in that hour or two

Why didn’t I meet Lucka

in a jazz bar

now that’s an easier question

by far

we never finished

what we never started

and I never stopped.

but, it’s too late now

eve to say

Sometimes it is just too late

.

Untitled

Sometimes we want to be something we’re not. Sometimes, sadly, we succeed. So it was with us that summer.

He Never

One time when he was home

throwing crushed cans

into an over-full bin

I felt brave, maybe angry

‘Aren’t you gonna give me any advice’

I said

‘About life and that’

When he burped a response

Shit in work time

he said

laughed, and crushed another can

I used to think he stopped beating me

‘cos I got too big

Now I know he learned he didn’t have to

I never much had a job

shat in my own time all my life

if you can call it a life

Suzy never

told me to get one

‘s all I remember her say

Down the gym I worked the boys all day

got cocky

and got it knocked out of me

however I changed I was always me

and always something missing

the anger never goes away

you just learn to hold it better

‘cept that one day

You spend your time hitting men

who can take a punch

you forget

how soft a man’s head can be

no gloves

should make you pull your punches

land soft

but if it only hurts after

I think he bled out of everything

not a lot

A Wetherspoons sachet

out of his ear, his nose, his mouth

smeared with that last twitch of him

I’ll get out in three

Gav’ll be four

and I can see it now

when he grows too old to beat

I don’t want it to be like that

but when I close my eyes at night

it’s him on that pavement

or it’s me after

If he’d o’ told me

I’d understand it when I’m older

he could say he told me so

but he never

and he can’t

.

I would tip well

I would have

for one year here

for one year there

my post delivered

to a favoured cafe

and brought to me

in my favourite seat

which would be plaqued

upon my moving on

 

It would be brought

with journals

and the half-read books

I might deposit

behind the counter

for curious waitresses

to sneek on cigarette breaks

 

I would smile infrequently

indescriminately

share a joke

with a favoured one or two

whose rotas, tacitly,

would merge with my habitual hours

 

Those not talking with me

now and then

would talk about me

“they say he [this]“

“they say he [that]“

 

I might buy a painting

to be installed

perhaps a turntable

an LP or two

 

Certainly felt pads

for the chairs and tables

draw, drunk,

a Mario Lanza

on a beer matt or three

a private joke

to be put up on the walls

for posterity

 

I’d be known

for my mannerisms

but know others too

This one folds napkins

This one cleans

This one texts

never the same boy twice

another drums fingers and thumbs

beards come and beards go

tattoos like moss on new roofs

an embarrassed unfraternity

of regulars

alternating glances

 

I would tip well

return to my hotel

to reflect on a day’s work

if work it was

borderline bilious

with green tea

and cogitation

 

Fifty weeks of such

might be too much

all the mutterings

comings and goings

and talk of my genius

from newspaper rustlers

kugelhopf munchers

and phrasebook flicking

merchandised mugwumps

proof enough

of my mediocrity

to settle bills

and leave no forwarding address

 

Gone, one or two will go

people will talk

of the good old days

photos,

serruptitiously taken,

will be collated, installed

kitsch settle in

more then leave

self consciousness descend

as a new legend grows

toast rack mailshots

filling elsewhere

as a new one or two

learn, tacitly,

I tip well

and a new hotel

grows accostomed to the sound

of my late night blues

.

 

 

blooms

there is no bank

for experiences

no withdrawal

from a thrifted supply

There is only now

Now and Now again

a Fibonacci of Now

that starts Here

regret grows like mushrooms

only breaks through foundations

like the triffids

on Gardnener’s Questions.

It grows from rotted now

mulched and broken

there is no bank

for experiences

no withdrawal

from thrifted supply

Even now

Yes, even Now!

there is a now

willing you, Willing to bloom

Truth

as tricky

to put your finger on

as a fragment of shell

in a bowl-full of egg

.