Dear F,

Dressed in this Union Jack
suit with it’s big feet
and oversized hands,
young people put the boot in.

I’ve got bruises like watermelons,
my knees are butter mountains.
They don’t appreciate I’m a man
in here not a cartoon.

It’s like a burqa. People can only see
my eyes. I’m a security risk. Police
ask for my I.D. , regular. Where’s
the fun gone in dressing up?

My bulldog mask doesn’t help.
I get my ears tweaked,
snout grabbed with two fingers,
“onk, onk.” I sweat

like Billy O, and toddle
the hashish canals until my next
bruise. A toke or two relieves
the pain and I’m glad for the money.

My landlady between tricks
hands me her shopping list.
Once I’ve got heavy bags
in each hand I’m an easy target.

Regular football chipped and sliced.
Received good wishes from D.
Sometimes she’s not all there,
other times she’s wick.

Please send another £300 quid.
I might last a month on the street
theatre then have to consider
factory work, or god forbid, office.

Yours in Europe,

E.

*******

(F to G)

Dear G,

You know when you have
all yours keys out, but for the life,
can’t remember what locks
they all fit, or even what doors,

for the life, I can’t recall why
I’m writing to you. I’ll try jog
it in the right order, sometimes
it comes out higgledy wriggledy.

Tell you about what’s happened.
E is bound for death in a handcart,
or wheelbarrow. He’s on leave
from Europe or remaining a cartoon.

I took the washing upstairs
because it’s too rainy for the Siegfried
line. Hung it on the clothes donkey
until it’s dead dry, shaken not stirred.

Fabulous to you,

F.

PS The street signs tell me The Greatest is Dead and Jesus is Alive.

*******

(G to H)

Dear H,

I am waiting in the hospital cafe
run by volunteers. I arrived too early
with a vote of confidence
from the weather that has let us off,

with a caution, for now. Most folk
are after asking what most things
are for and where they’re going next.
I had a black coffee and Bakewell flapjack.

We’re all waiting for results. Yay
or nay. Decided by other folk.
Heard a lady in Tescos shout:
“I’m not having you order me about.

I’m not having anybody, least of all men
dictate what I must do!” I smiled at her
and she scuttled past. Not sure she saw
me with how folk are always rushed

with this mindfulness and filling in
colouring books like as if they were kids
in junior school with a bit of time
to themselves which they haven’t

got with these SITS or is it SATS.
I know they’ve to sit down to them.
Testing their incompetence
says E. He’s gone foreign now.

O. Just got call for my appointment.
Well chemicals did bugger all.
Must be ripping my head open now,
then. Aye, that’s answer all are waiting on.

Good Outcomes and God’s Best to thee,

G.

*******

(H to I)

Dearest I,

Our love is a dream of Europe
united, my Big Ben and your
bateaud Seine. My Bratwurst
and your Bridge of Sighs.

Saw a chap today trundling down
what few cobbles we have left
a coffin with a wheelbarrow in it.
“What did the wheelbarrow die of?”

I shouted. “No wheels” he replied.
Have to make sure wheels don’t
come off our barrow my love,
else we’ll be manuring the cemetery.

Our Polish Deli is now a supermarket
of foreign goods and phrases. It’s
like a puzzle. I’m defeated
when I’m forced to ask for help with the labels.

Hope our love isn’t a puzzle. Or
at least only a quick crossword.
I’m your Greek bail out,
you’re my Referendum.

Decide to see me soon.
I’ll suffer more austerity,
be on the bread line
for a touch of your lips.

Hot for you,

H.

Dear B,

There’s a street party somewhere
on my body: kids are crying
and chasing their icecream
down the gutters with the rain.

Russians are running
hooligans at the French
and English. Liberated.

Rain still knocks at doors
and windows but we’re determined
not to let it in without proof
of good intentions and a trade.

Outside the food bank a lad
celebrates the Queen’s 90th
by taking a coffin in a wheelbarrow
down the buntinged high street.

Admiration,

A.

*******

Dear C,
The street party referendum voters
would have us abandon our Ardenne
Pate and Parma Ham of unknown
import and export.
Chap called with a wheelbarrow.
He wanted to know whether
we were into buying his Mam’s
manure fresh out of her coffin.
Don’t walk under A’s legs else
you’ll get bad luck. She insulted me yesterday, said I were big up top
and down below. I defended mesen,

saying I were buxom and bubbly.
She called me a bitch, I called her an arse.
We laughed. Kept backbone of English natty.
Blessings.

B.

*******

(C to D)

Hi D,

bit of crisis last night, water
pissing through bathroom ceiling.
Put towels down and got blacked
up tracing roof leak in loft.

Called plumber who advised turning
water off. Still dripping through.
Summer is leaking all over,
and clearing its tubes.

His mam were in a shitheap coffin
while I knocked nails into his wobbly
wheelbarrow, rustbucket. Coffin
were floating like a boat.

A still moaning about B.

Consolations,

C.

*******

(D to E)

Dear D,

This should really reach you
before you go abroad
to be a pantomime terrorist.
I’m sneezing, a lot.

Must be the dust in the air
from your winged stilettos.

Walking round our new Polish
deli is like going abroad. You
don’t get a word of what’s what
and have to read the pictures,

like they did in churches
in the olden days or ask
a guide, a shop assistant
as to what stuff is. Our F

would know because he’s
been learned right, has languages
and all those hard words
in his head. I ask him,

don’t reckon on understanding
his answer like, have to take
it home and cogitate over it.
I get it eventually.

Dearest to you,

D.

P.S. Don’t get wet.

TO BE CONTINUED

I chat to the museum curator
of the motor museum
at his post behind the counter.
“Have to bring my wife. She
was into bikes, and can remember
every…”

He looks at me.

“every…”

I am an idiot.

“Those things with numbers
and letters on the front
of cars?”

“Number plates”.
He replies with sharp sarcasm,
and no smile.

The older I get

what were once obvious words

arrive less

and less when and where I need them.

(i)

She hates him making her safe.
Remembers times when she

searched her pockets and the sofa
for fag money and the floating

ten pound note she would give
to him and him to her when they were short.

“Life is boring when there’s no edge to it.” she says.

(ii)

“There should be summat to fight for!
Who needs an easy road,
without people and obstacles,
so there’s nothing
to work around,

nothing to tell tales,
weep, wail and witter,
scrimp, scrape and scratter,
gripe, grieve and grapple about?”

(iii)

He wants the comfy chair,
in front of the TV.
All bills paid, no mortgage,
home fit to live in.
An easy going on.

Only he likes strong, passionate
women. They rearrange him,
upset, rattle and upside down him
with tirades about what
he hasn’t done, what they think
he’s done, what they think he’s about.

(iv)
She’ll do time
for next bloke
doles his fist
at her, on her, in her.

Next one who controls
like her mother.

Him, ligged out sozzled
on her sofa when
there’s chores to be done.

Expects meat and two veg.,
won’t change his habits,
go places, do stuff.

(v)

You’re mandled, mollycoddled.
Need to be chivied and mithered.

Too long seen you topple
your Mam and Dad grab
you up, smartish, to console.

Too much smothered
when deep in debt,
pulled out the mire,
dusted down and placed
on decent path, again.

Not fended and fought,
bended and bought,
mended your own path,
cleared undergrowth,
tramped and stamped
with your own sore feet.

No blisters and sores,
cuts and grazes you’ve picked
washed out ingrained grit,
gravel while grimaced.

(vi)

And he would say if he could:
“Not everyone’s your mother!
Not everyone’s after making
you miscarry that faith in yourself.

Pregnant with youthful confidence,
she had you haul her heavy boned
bloated hatred that you were ever born
from room to room, up
and down steep stairs to inflict
a bloody carcass on your womb.

You did as she asked but ensured
that little bairn gave
you a reason to go on.
A clear eye to nuture.
A warmth to cuddle.
A life to save.”

(vii)

” I’m not going to seed
sat on my arse.
Alzheimer fodder.

Comfort zones are killing zones.
Once, I was hard as nails.

You’re useless.
Used to be someone
to butt up against.
Challenge me.

You’ve made me soft, and I’ve let you.

Never knew how exhausted
I was. Batteries recharged.

I’ll stay with you, for now.

A daily reminder

of what I don’t need.

I need a gun to my head.

A knife at my throat.

I’ll put me back
in the fire.”

She hates him making her safe.
Remembers times when she

searched her pockets and the sofa
for fag money and the floating

ten pound note she would give
to him and him to her when they were short.

“Life is boring when there’s no edge to it.” she says

I am in a coach seat
sat back with my seatbelt on
because it’s the law
on a dual carriageway
following the dots
like a pair of scissors
before the polite notice
“Please cut here.”

Dressed for summer
in sandals and a Silver Surfer T Shirt.
Norrad the Surfer in his silver
underpants on a board
that rides the skyways
he agreed to be a herald
for the planet eater Galactus,
to stop his lover being killed
and his planet eaten by Galactus.

And he came to earth
and said you’re not eating
this one and opposed his boss
he’s exiled to earth,
unable to return
to his planet and his lover.
And it made me sad,
even though he was
dressed in his underpants.

Every story was about him
doing the best for folk
and them not understanding,
saying he was alien
and they didn’t want him.
Like you think folk do to you
when you’re a teenager,
or younger and wish
you had a planet and a lover
to fight for like a hero
in metal underpants.

(i)

Forward Froggy Fretwell promises sloppy snogs behind the prefab at playtime.
.
In our dark den in the wood under
the grey coarse blanket nicked

from Mam’s black spot airing cupboard,
Froggies piggies taste like penny chews,

“This little piggy went to market,
this little piggy had roast beef,

this little piggy had none,
and this little piggy

went wee, wee, wee, wee
all the way home” tickling

all the way up her under her skirt
to her white panties where she’s weed

herself laughing, “Poo”, I say. “Don’t put
your liquorice stick near it. Don’t want

babies.” she says smiling through her braces,
her blue eyes glinting in late summer sun.

(ii)

Nanna’s bunions hobbled
her stance for years.

She chose sandals that allowed
the bulbous growth air.

A regular visit from a pedicurist
kept that pain at bay.

She only used a stick under protest
the last few months before death.

(iii)

Laid on her front,
I have my back to her,
her feet either side
of me over thick green
Egyptian cotton towel,

brushes my back with her Achilles.
I switch on the coarse roller,
gently move it up and down each toe,
hard dead skin falls like snow.

Twenty years a nurse, she stood
ealies and lates in operating theatres.
” You can’t ask
patient to put their finger
in the hole as you’ve reached
end of your shift and ‘ll be
back tomorrow.” she laughs.

She almost nods off,
the massage is an electric
spring after winter.

(iv)

My mam riddled with cancer
put her steroid fat feet
over my step dad’s legs
on the couch
as they watched tv.

He massaged her feet
as if he could remove her pain.

(v)

Dad’s feet are always gross.
Sat at the end of their double bed

a sheet of “Wakefield, Pontefract
and Casteford Express” laid on the bedroom carpet,

toe clippers in hand he slowly cuts each nail,
rarely sprinkles the paper with them,

instead they ping all over,
onto Mam’s court shoes and under

her dressing table, into the hallway,
and weeks later barefoot to the bathroom

my soft soles pierced bloody
by his stray parings.

(vi)
She decides to sleep with him,
when she sees his rolling gait.
His tongue lolls at the roundness
of her ankles as she catwalks.
Over dinner
he inhales the jasmine perfume
of her high arches and curves,
puts his feet between her legs
and gently kneads her wet.
Later, after red wine,
she wraps her two feet around
his penis, her toes tickle his balls.
His feet are muscly and strong.
She says “Your feet are nice and smooth.”
She caresses them softly, teases his toes
with her lips then kisses
between them, sucks them,
into and out of her mouth,
as if each digit a sweet lolly,

ten cousins of the big toe
without nail between his legs.

He follows instep curve
to taste dessert in her kneaded folds.

(vii)

Mam gets out the stinky vinegar
like we’re having fish and chips.

“Stop fidgeting your feet!”, she reprimands
as she uses cotton wool to coat

my verrucaed foot. Like an alien
from Doctor Who, or triffid.

“No you can’t go swimming. You’ll spread disease. Disgusting boy!”

I)

 
She read her first hands.

Small, spatula shaped.

Stumpy fingers.

Not large enough to be manual.

Not thin enough to be artistic.

 
Wanted to be a true reflection

of others, but his surface

held too many imperfections.

His eyes were blank spheres,

his conflict in his palms.

 
He would lie to her.

Keep things to himself.

 
He gave her doubt.

 
(ii)

 
Another’s Long tender digits play timpani

between her legs. Their slender

reach

works a flood within her.

 
As they helter skelter

spirals from tip to base

 
on each of her breasts

she loses control when

 
they are half way down

the slide and she flies.

 
His tongue: a ninth finger,

touch types her labia

 
so she breathes glossolalia

with her ninth finger.

 
He made her feel good

 
(iii)

 
Another: more fish than man.

His skin has scales

 
between his fingers,

at their base

a thin film to make

any swim easier.

 
His imagination is a fish bladder.

He swerves over her coral.

 
She saw another way to live.

 
(iv)

 
She examines her hands in awe,

as if newly discovered.

 
Amazed they belong to her,

and that she controls them.

 
Curls each finger, notes

how each joint works.

 
Finger of one hand follows

the lines of the other

 
as if to remap, retraverse

the landscapes of age.

 
She let her know what was to come.

 
(v)

In the purple blossom

of her bruises

 
she traces the shape

of his knuckles.

 
Cries at the glad fall

into the gentle browns

 
of his eyes, strength

of his black hair.

 
She learns how to leave,

how to say “no”.

 
(vi)

 
His wife has chocolate fingers,

dark and sweet,

 
inhale bubblegum

from the tips,

 
pink wafer nails,

taste of red fruit wine.

A taste that doesn’t cloy,

not syrupy or over sugared.

This woman knows how to work her fingers

 
(vii)

 
Daddy God finger, abuse finger, where are you?

Here I am, here I am, let me do you, let me do you.

 
Mummy Mary finger, let him finger, where are you?

Here I am, here I am. Let him do you. Let him do you.

 
Brother finger, Cain finger, where are you?

Here I am, Here I am, ready to kill, ready to kill.

 
Sister finger, Mercy finger, where are you?.

Here I am, Here I am, Pray to you, pray to you.

 
Baby finger, Jesus finger, where are you?

Here I am, here I am. Killed for you, killed for you.

 
Graspy thumb, toolly thumb, where are you?

Here I am. Here I am. Work for you, work for you.

 
(viii)

 
Tiny lamb’s hooves gain purchase

in the grooves of gust worn cracks

 
beneath a looming ancient stone crag.

Little fingers like young stones caught ,

 
in the raked valleys of a Zen garden,

a tiny baby grasps Dad’s finger base ,

 
cranes eyes to the precipice edge ,

the furrowed horizon of skin.

 
(ix)

 
Her hand is a military formation.

Four sharp spears stand upright,

or stab forward,

or curl with the thumb

into a bony shield,

of knuckles.

 
Too much like his.

 
(x)

 
His loam palms,

carrot fingers,

parsnip thumbs,

bring harvest

over our threshold.

Sustenance.

 
(xi)

 
His butter fingers

massage themselves

 
into her body

until he is no more

 
and she glows

with oil of him.

He makes her shine.

 
(xii)

 
“Best left till late in life.”

He says “So many nerve

 
endings when you get it done.

And near the knuckle

 
for other folk as you can’t

really keep them hid.”

 
Wide awake turquoise eyes

of his late wife, one

 
per hand follow me

round the room.

 
“She was always one

for eyeing up other blokes.”

he says.

 
(xiii)

 
Twenty canvasses of your own.

Each nail is a canvas.

 
Even two year olds daub

them with a tiny brush.

 
On every high street two or three

businesses compete cuticles.

 
No airheads chewing gum,

buffing nails and passing calls.

 
Operating theatre masks,

nail drying machines by their side.

 
French or gel.

Indulged luxury in austerity.

 
At home sisters bond and learn

techniques of togetherness.

 
If you do mine, I’ll do yours.

Choose colour or tattoo.

 
Delicacy of touch and focus.

Mindfulness colouring book.

 
Pampered by laughter

and forgetting.

 
(xiv)

 
Nanna has no time for nails.

Forever pegs out on washing,

 
Her hands turn, twist,

push and pull, grind and grist,

 
make meals, scrub thresholds.

poss dirt, brush soot, polish tiles,

 
learn to live with bruises, blebs,

blisters, blemishes, bleeds,

 
mangle water, wring an easier

going on until convenience saves time.

 

 

 

(xv)

 
Grandad’s hands are made

of coal dust, and steel shavings.

 
Layers of ancient trees, molten

pig runs through his veins.

 
Lathe turned, tool maker palms

cradle call centre headset

 
in environmentally controlled

warehouse where he negotiates

 
customer complaints while

his hands grow soft his brain
works out, solution led,

business aligned conundrums.

(xvi)
Learn to read your own hands.

Family history in fingerprint ridges.

 
Smell yesterdays meals, how

seasons of heat and cold ingrain

 
in lines like longitude and latitude.

Like rocks weathered by smoke,

 
yellowed by tobacco stains, reddened

by beetroot, oranged by carrots

 
Blue black pen stain from school.

Scars of damage with stories attached.
You must use your eyes to see

your hands tell more than your eyes.