Poetic Prose

The Work Morning

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Drink the cold black tea kindly brought for you, you left to go cold
Open the blinds when she has gone
Compare the weather with a forecast.

Switch off the bedside light now there is some natural light. Carry the tea mugs downstairs and put in washing bowl. Let water run till hot.

Pour out fresh orange juice and cereal. Cut wholemeal teacakes in half
and use a knife to coat them in cheese spread. Cut teacakes in half.

Put foil sandwich packet in plastic box and that in work bag, with a bag of crisps, breakfast biscuits, banana, Satsuma, flask containing one teabag.

Place work bag on armchair before front door, place keys in front door lock. Drink orange juice, wash pots, eat cereal, check watch, clean teeth.

Switch Radio Two on for budgie and parrot, check they have enough food and water, and same for black and ginger cat. Check work swipe card.

Check time on mobile. Relieved no run for bus today. Walk downhill turn right, then uphill to bus stop. Step back for paper boy’s freewheeling bike.

Bus comes downhill. Hand signal bus to stop. Stopped, get on, use swipe travel card.Say ‘Morning.’ He says ‘Right. mate.’
Sit down and write twenty minutes.

Under footbridge press ‘Stop’ buzzer. Alight and five minute walk to work building. Scramble in pocket for work swipe card. Use card on swing doors.

Wait in queue for coffee machine. Check correct money in pocket. Touch screen with for correct coffee strength. Enter money. Retrieve plastic top for cup.

When buzzer sounds and image of imaginary full cup being retrieved shows
retrieve cup and snap on top. Carefully
hold as carry down corridor, double doors.

At entrance to work unit, check mobile messages, then switch it off. Use work swipe card to get on to work unit. Place
coffee carefully on desk. Find chair.

 

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The Unwarranted Delight

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A smile wants to be on my face.
I am not sure. I want to know
Why it had to ask at all
And not just happen
As it usually does?

Can I redeem my inaction as the rainbow
At my door glows through my letterbox.
Hope is to be allowed in
Rainbow knocks.
I am unsure of strange rainbows.

Happiness threatens to overwhelm.
I do not like being bullied
Even by good things.
I must teach it to offer itself politely
No rough housing

Autumn is season
When for no good reason
a fluttering in the stomach
a lifting of the heart
as if you have a crush
on nothing in particular

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Invisible Town Pavements (Ongoing)

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Invisible Town Pavement: is laid level over history,
Over cobble, over broken vase,
lost money,
Stare into workman’s dig
to see what is lost

Stare into jigger picked
high vis recall
Sweated out the dried carapace
squashed ancient trees
pressured into coal

Pavements are pages to be read. Each page a history inscribed marked cracked weathered. Every street a chapter, town a novel

Pavements are continually rewritten. New images, new characters added, others moved on. You are a character on a pavement.

Sometimes pavements need translating as they may trip up the unwary. Obstacles such as archaic language pedantic terms await

Invisible Town Plugged In

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Language changes as gusts change. Words lean into gust, hold their meaning until the earths breath changes direction

A way of looking moved on. Clack and phut of wooden shuttle, shuttled off. Wire Making pulled out, nail making hammered off

A new way of looking, perhaps a new industry growing into itself. Perhaps call centre headset on revised coat of arms

All is driven intravenously. Plug our veins in to provide fuel for mechanical engines. Plug veins into computers, TVs.

The Field

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Fresh cut wheat like first bread dust bakery in a field. Childhood dash through sharp cut stalks flail ankles blood pain. French bread joie

Mechanically scythed corn, harvested into grey plastic bags, vegetarian sausage rolls spread evenly over short fields.

Invisible Town suffers

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 Invisible Town: only has orphaned children, who scavenge bins, old farms, desolate supermarkets, learn to kill chickens, rabbits, survive

Invisible Town: has built in obsolescence and eternal reinvention. Dreams made of new materials with a decay date.

Invisible Town: is a bomb shelter until others invention is strong, deep enough to bring blood, remove safety

Invisible Town: is coastal as all towns. Fishing main job. All Fisher people. Sewing nets, fleshing catches, praying for safe return.

warnings go out. Move. This house/school/building will be demolished. If message not heeded your memory will be honoured.

conctete motorways, flyovers, high rise living are the thing. Little homes squeeze into a few feet. Noise abatement unknown.

Barefoot is the new black. Feet are judged as to cleanliness, artistry. Tattooed is trending. Foot Features on the famous

None Has Stayed

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She brings men up
She can see whats in them.

Then they leave her.

None has stayed.

She swore never

 get hurt again.

Takes me

in her arms

 says ‘I’ve got a child already.

I don’t need another.’

‘I will not carry you.’

She curves my wet dreams.

Denies herself for her child,

others

‘My son is more mature than you.’

Makes each man she chooses

Then they leave her.

None has stayed.

She sees strength
behind their eyes,
in their arms,

Tells them it needs bringing out.

Every man has left his mark.

She asked them to leave.

None has stayed .

The Whispering Breath

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I’ve not told you everything he did to us. (whispering breath)
It’s why I’m sat on edge
of bed using upstairs phone.

Got to speak quietly.
My fault.
He keeps telling me

(conspiratorial breath)

I caused it
by what I did.

(questioning breath)
Is it something in me that’s at fault?’
Have l something wrong with me?
Am I a good person?

 I’m afraid of him. What he might do
If I do this or the other.
I have no feeling for him.

(accusatory breath)
He says I’ve made the Love go.
He threatens me
because this is the only way

to

get it back.
I’m terrified, love.

(weeping breath)
Doesn’t lack of love mean more love needs to be given, not hate?

(angry breath)
He likes Old Testament. ‘Eye for an eye … ‘
calls himself Christian.
Knows the Bible off by heart.
Laughs at my attempts

 to read it and so argue against him,

(determined breath)
Each person’s got to be responsible for themselves.

 

‘Never’ and ‘Always’ from The Place For Breath

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‘NEVER AND ‘ALWAYS’

1.

I lay with you. Two words make one.
You say ‘You’ve strong legs. Your too heavy. ‘

No space for breath. Our words.

Make too short. A sentence.

I kiss you.
You say ‘You have a firm jaw.

You smother. ‘

My word does not make room for yours.

You lay with me. Two pictures make one
My heart bloody in my mouth.

 I want to crush you into my frame.

You kiss me
I press till all feeling goes.

My frame has no blood.

2

too much leaves nothing else

a space, a breath, a gap. Almost a full stop.

 too little leaves an absence

a space, a breath, a gap. Almost a full stop.

Enough
is rare for both of us.

perfectionists

we put up each others

inspiration, expiration

for reasons to stay not to be alone

a single word, a single sentence

without company of another

a picture with a wall to itself, a room

to itself, a gallery to itself

reasons to be alone
but not to stay that way.

You are afraid I will wander,

hold anothers attention, anothers breath

in my mouth

because I am younger.

I think

how promises are never kept

 We both agree
‘Never’ and Always’
are not to be said. Words that do not belong in our sentences.

Pictures that we do not want on our wall

Explorations from ‘The Place for Breath’

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The place between me and you. The place between words between sentences is the same between pictures in a gallery. I find that which we have in common and fill in the gaps between our chat on telephone or in fact. Each time I am left with a different picture of you to contemplate. A different pause between one part of a sentence, and the next. I’m afraid at some point reaching a full stop.