Procrastination

(For Rosie, and less important things)

The wood pigeons are weighing
Down the branches of the trees
Outside, the light throwing the
Roof tiles into relief and me
Off topic-
Past saving
Face or time or words
But who needs
Face or time, when words
Can make time
Feel different, or faces
Out of things I’ve only heard.

That clock shackles me to minutes
Locks me in its clicking limits
There’s no time for art, you are
Just born and then you start.

Harry Met Sally

The second when
A good night turned
Into your lips and mine
And a doorway conversation
Into blurring all our lines
And your silence giving way
To make a clamour of our sighs
Your hands on me in the hallway
And the world asleep inside

I didn’t think you had it in you,
But you did
And so did I.

The Riddle of the Sphinx

'She took these rooms for the pleasure of going there with her veil down, and imagining she was a heroine. She had a passion for secrecy, but she herself was merely a Sphinx without a secret.' - Oscar Wilde


King’s Cross
And a head full of questions,
Waiting on my gorgeous wings;
My feline pace anticipates
Your answers,
I will dig my claws in.
But the thing is
I’m a sphinx without a secret-
A riddle you can resolve
With your lips.

You jump the barrier,
A smile I can’t explain away
Give me the right answer, and
You just might live.

Miss-Adventure

(this one won the prize)

With your rough fingers grazing the soft skin
Under jagged wool my bones are exposed
You look at me with eyes pretty as sin
But you’re too close and we’re too close to home-

In company on threadbare velvet seats
The clink of glasses muffles our glances
The din and dim light heightens and retreats
As our hands make their silent advances.

We never walk together, going home
I walk with others, talk of starry skies
And even though we know everyone knows
We savour opportunities to lie.

Tomorrow I will utter not a word
Of kisses I’ve stolen, or heartbeats heard.

The Function of Criticism at the Present Time

Abstraction Street;
Derrida’s blind
Twitches
At my approach
Like an eye
Run on no sleep.
Sharp face obscured
By French windows;

He’s right to be curious.

My hobnailed boots
On Eliot’s
Delphiniums,
The conserved lawns-
Contrition
And the individual
Latent, while I
Play with stray words;

He’s right to be furious.

Mr Arnold
Nose pressed against
A frosted pane,
Earnest whiskers
Bristling, at
The nerve of the sweet
Philistine, who's
Stealing his light;

He's right to be serious.

I’m moving in
Ramshackle house
Built on
Sand and flat vowels,
Drama in the
Kitchen sink,
With a roof that
Lets the sky in;

There goes the neighbourhood.