Selected poems

The Romance of the Cup

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

Colin loved the Cup,
more than the plate or the saucer,
or the complete works
of Geoffrey Chaucer.

He stopped seeing his mates,
took it out on dates,
to the museum, the pictures,
to Pam’s All-American diner,
Colin and his old china.

He drank from it greedily,
speedily, needily
until one night, in a bath
lit by a water-lily floating candle,
he asked for its handle
in marriage.

Some said that to wed
crockery made a mockery
of matrimony
and remembered with acrimony
the time his sister, Trish,
got engaged to a ramekin dish.

But one week before the big day,
he slipped while carrying
the breakfast tray,
its contents fell to the floor
and clattered.

Colin’s Cup dreams lay shattered.

Upon Awakening to the Sound of Distant Rumbles

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

He awakes from seasonal slumbers,
to distant rumbles. A storm approaching,
perhaps, or the muffled guns from
the ghost of a war long since waged
upon faded fields.

The dawn chorus wakens the dead and
rattles the brain as the back street clatter
recedes into murmured memory and the
awful truth emerges. Bin day! The revised
collection days due to the Christmas holiday.
Thoughts fly unbidden to the rooms

of recycling, Pennines of packaging,
glaciers of glass, corridors of cardboard and cartons,
growing, overflowing, silently creeping up the staircase,
across the landing, clawing at the bedroom door.
The horror! The horror!

He lies there and tries to collect himself.

A Sticky End

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

On the phone, the police found some photos
Of its owner skewered on a hilltop in Devon.
It appeared his possession of a selfie stick
Provided both the motive and murder weapon.

Satsumas are the Only Fruit

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

O how I love to consume a satsuma!
A satsuma a day leads to good humour.

To obtain one I would fight a lion or puma
or risk the revenge of wrathful Montezuma.

For the sweet taste of just one satsuma
I would listen to a concerto of tuba,
learn the three major dialects of Yoruba,
read the minutes of the 1906 Duma.

The merest rumour of a buried satsuma
would see me turn fructo-archaeologist/exhumer.

Juicy-sweet segmental sensation!
Luscious litmus-testing, citrus-besting Christmas elation!
O how I love to consume a Satsuma!

It is also easier to rhyme than orange.

Terry’s Mistake

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

Surveying his handiwork,
Terry realised he’d made a mistake
in buying Italy for Jo’s Christmas present.

Not only did it take ages to wrap up
but she was bound to guess what it was
by its distinctive boot-like shape.

He now also needed to get a bigger tree.

supermarket

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

in the supermarket of her love life,
she rummaged in the rubble of reduced items,
looking for something edible,
if perhaps not entirely credible

later,
in the bagging area of her bed,
she found the unexpected item of Fred

After the Fall

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

After he fell off the wall and it became clear
That all the king’s horses and all the king’s men
Couldn’t put him together again,
He was taken home.

His wife looked at him.
He wasn’t like the egg she used to know.
He was cracked and broken
And wouldn’t come out of his shell.
That’s the end of my love life,
Thought Mrs Humpty Dumpty,
No more rumpty-pumpty.

Body Language

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

Doug considered himself an expert
in reading Denise’s body language.

He made a study of her
and identified three main patterns of behaviour:

1) the way in which upon seeing him
she would dart into a nearby hedgerow

2) the way in which she would clamp her hands
tightly to her ears and close her eyes whenever he talked

3) the way in which, when once his hand lightly brushed hers,
she looked enquiringly into his eyes and then applied
an elbow to his ribs and a toe-cap to his shins

Doug understood
the unspoken intentions
hidden beneath the actions.

It was clear that she was desperately in love with him.

onion

Assorted Poems, Selected poems

when Jane described Clarence
as being like an onion,
he was thrilled to think
she saw him as multi-layered,
with such a lot going on
beneath the surface that
only after much peeling
would the revealing
of the real Clarence
become apparent

and so, later,
he was disappointed
to hear that she was referring
to his purple-red, papery skin
and the fact
that he would
occasionally emit
a volatile gas
that would bring tears
to her eyes