Bus Station Reaper (a semi-true story…)

Bus Station Reaper

One of those startled May mornings,
spring just about catching on to herself.
He’s stuck inside by a cardboard stand.
Top of the creaky bus station escalators.
Superdrug and the fruit and veg place,
the one that’s not been there for years.

Upright sentinel – bold man in black.
But not Will Smith or Johnny Cash.
Smile on loan from the Cheshire Cat.
Palms clasped, cuffs peeping pristine.
Suitably suited and booted. I don’t
buy it – whatever it is he’s selling.

I swerve an eyes-down panic-zag
through tired formica tables spilling
like ingrained tea-stains from the café.
Fumble my bags, my phone, look busy.
“No thank you” poised on my tongue.
He’s got broad shoulders – can’t help

but notice. And that smile, Cheshire,
but not cheesy. Still Cheshire-ing me.
Like he knows things. Really sees me.
Cynicism slips: I glance, snag his eye.
“Funeral Plans – will you rest assured?”
He winks. I remember I am very late.

 

Unreadable (but hopefully this poem isn’t!)

Unreadable

You think
you’re indecipherable.
Unreadable mystique.

Riddles laid like trip wires.
throughout our home.
Locks bolted and dead.

Your security features.
Thoroughly alarmed.
You take no chances.
Insurance is key.

Sleight of hand, in glove,
up sleeves. Under your hat.
Safe-keeping. Distraction
techniques. Oh look!
A white rabbit! Ta-da!

Clever old you.

Each night you force-feed me
the choke-splintered bones
of the world’s reddest herrings.

They water my eyes to clarity.
How sharp is this steak knife?

You’re indecipherable
you think. Too much.
If I read you, I’d weep.

Falling In Spring

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Falling In Spring

Blossom lying in dirty gutters.
So many clunky metaphors:
tragi-innocence-trampled-beauty;
delicate and new – then she fell;
too fragile to bloom here for long;
kicked to wither in litter and mud.

We mourn the sweet-petalled.
Leak tears to sluice them clean
for cosy graves we will not dig.
We’d rather rest them nearby.
To calcify their whiteness.
Preserve and save and keep.

Our frail heroines. Their eyes
know slow wishing-well drownings.
Weak lungs and shallow breaths.
Tentative fingers, sighing tremors.
We will pull them still closer in
like wet tubercular handkerchiefs.

These library-famed Cinderellas.
Gothic-pure deposed princesses:
they are easily spotted. Snared.
Disintegrating in Havisham’s lace.
We have a craving they can slake.
Sniff them out to grant sanctuary.

Would we bother with them at all
if we couldn’t crush them dead
under quick boots? If the blossom
did not drift and fall, would we
feel we had any right to catch?
If they weren’t so sad and pretty?

Grass And Dew

Grass And Dew

Goosepimples on bare limbs.
Dew licks her dress to her body,
grass-stains to drink-spilled silk.

Cliché of birdsong. A childhood
half-ghost of milkfloats, burnt toast.
Lost homework and things that

don’t matter anymore. What does?
Where are her shoes? Eyes won’t
open and the drifting milkfloat

has whirred on and away. Now
she lies afraid in the dawn.
Suburban shame, in a garden

which isn’t at her house. Paralysis.
No memory, handbag, keys
or anything useful. Sicky scum

on her tongue, a grazed elbow.
Watch lost, along with pride
and tights and blank hours

she won’t get back. She daren’t
even think about her knickers.
Need to get home. Need home.

By the way… For a little while now I’ve been meaning to set up a section on here giving details of magazines, etc. who’ve kindly published my work. There’s a link at the bottom of each blog post and I hope that this section will grow in the months ahead. But for now… here it is!

http://hollyannegetspoetic.wordpress.com/publications-where-ive-been/

Following (with a bit of vintage Blondie thrown in for good measure)

Following

I’m not following you. Honest. Promise.
It’s mere coincidence. I just happen
to be there whenever you look round.
And you always look right at me. Maybe
it’s you who’s doing the following.

Because I’m certainly not following you.
I’ve got no interest in wherever you go.
The inside of your house is so very dull.
And your route to work bores me silly.
What’s so extra-special about you?

I’m not following you. Not anymore.
It’s not me, it’s you. Still, you enjoyed
our moment. Friends’ swallowed gulps
when you revealed you’d got a Stalker!
Following the co-dependent is a turn off.

 

 

Wolf

Wolf (My, How He’s Grown!)

Just a pup.
Wriggly with new.
Pink-padded paws
skitter-patter dancing.
Jumping up, up, up!
Sloppy-licks kissing better
those needle-tooth nibbles
to your hands, your face.
You’re smiling, laughing.
He’s baby-growling.
What a good boy!
He loves to play.

Now he’s grown.
No longer a pup.
Needle teeth long gone,
snapped out in a vicious
gnaw of chew toy tugging.
Coarsened coat, lean lopes
of legs to chase you down,
in panting, darkness panic.
Firm-planting paws to pinion.
Raw-torn meat breath, wet.
Jaws to your neck.
He loves to play.

 

And a canine-themed tune…

Consume

Consume

Lip-sheathed bites
disguised as kisses.
Less than tender.

They peck and worry
your soft-spot want.
Behind your left ear,

perfume allergy sting.
Queasy lust itches
for long fingernails.

A rash fevers up red.
Breakable epidermis.
Blood jumping to run.

So near the surface.
It clamours. Shrieks
for his teeth’s release.

Purple Tongue

Purple Tongue

Her breath is chemical-sweet.
Saccharine and batteries.
Powder-sniff theatrical,

she slicks on the pan-stick,
rolls eyes like cheats’ dice.
Her purpled tongue drags

chill-burns on vodka ice.
Hands whip despicable slices,
rip new holes for weeping.

Fingertips smear wet hearts
on fogged glass. She singles
out limpets and lingerers.

Pinocchio

Pinocchio

The lies slip soft from your tongue,
like dribble, like when you doze
with your mouth dropping open.
They pool on a sofa cushion.
Harmless, a little silly and sweet.
“Oh bless, Let’s let him nap.”

It should be different. The lies,
sliming and sliding from your mouth:
they should hurt, cause you pain.
A Pinocchio nose for the modern man.

Your tongue should swell, bulbous
and throbbing, with the poison it slops.
Your saliva curdle acidic, metallic,
so your teeth rot brown and spongy
and your gums recoil in disgust.

Your lips should blister and crack,
a bloody frame, shrinking back,
from the corrosive foulness within.
“It’s what’s inside that counts.”

Your stomach should roil, up-gorging
uncontainable gases, oily bile to choke
your spasming throat and, even when
you sweat and gulp to swallow it down,
like a good boy, like Mummy taught you.
that churning mouthful of vomit
should leave your breath
sour and rancid.

That way we would know.

 

I wrote the original draft of this three or four years ago… Given it a bit of nip and tuck!

 

Snow-Felled

Posting an old one from last year, partly as a test as I’m having some techie issues with the blog and awaiting comments from the WP support team. If you’ve had problems reaching this page, many apologies…. I’m on the case. And also, new stuff will hopefully appear soon, once I’ve ironed out the glitches. In the meantime, here’s that re-post…

 

Snow-Felled

I wonder how long it would take?
If you were knocked out, flat on your back
on the top of the Beacon, in a blizzard:
unconscious, unmoving, unprotected.
I wonder how long it would take

for the falling white to cover you?
Smother you. Blanket your form.
A horizontal lying snowman,
featureless and silent.
A shiftless drift around you.
No snow angels to guard you.
A January unmourned burial mound.

I wonder how long it would take?
People know all about your nocturnal
wandering ways. Wannabe Heathcliff
swaying to howl on our hilltops.
Smalltown eccentric, silly old pisshead.
Maybe this time your whiskey-coat
wasn’t quite enough
to keep you warm.

Maybe the elements,
the wind, the sleet, the ice,
are not the friends you glorified.
Not that you knew.
Maybe you just had a little lie down.