:

She’d leave this mattress and rest
now and again, but I’d never
witnessed it; always when I called

she was positioned
for a quick entry; on the bedside table

:

When we come face to face
with the big-headed, long-tailed gulpers
our ears tell us we’ve come deep enough

but the burst boil on my arse
was what prompted me

:

He’s propped by three pillows
in a bed by the widow, talks to his toes
who’ve been deaf since his back

came off worst in an argument
with a car that didn’t stop for tea

:

Not now, Petula, not while your sister’s taste
is on my tongue and my loins throb
like the gum around an abscessed tooth
at the thought of her; wait

:

Adam Eves he calls himself,
but you’ll not be spat at
if you think it’s a pseudonym.
He’s into nudism.

‘Ah’, I hear you say, ‘maybe
he’s a descendant' -- but

:

An angry wave had swept the ship ashore,
then scumbags came and pilfered from the hold.
The crew, all drunk, were strewn across the deck,
but when the light of later filtered in,

:

Eluned stands alone beneath the clock,
A crimson petal topples from her breast
And lands beside a tear upon the deck;
The ghost she loves has failed to manifest.

:

He was bright as a may tree
until a branch snapped. I watched
him stumble down a dark drive,
using the moon as a torch --
when it died on him

clouds pressed his brain

:

He asks to speak to Madam Butterfly,
they say ‘she doesn’t sing here anymore --
she upped and left for Switzerland last May
and we don’t know if she’ll be coming home’.

:

In the corridor

wheelchairs are parked
for the night. She’s on a late fly-by visit.
It’ll be a quick bedside chat, no walk
in the grounds -- stopping at

:

My grandfather stood here
and saw this bit of past happen.
A mountain as big as this one

faced him, pleaded with him to intervene,
but his protest days were long over,

:

It comes as no surprise when he decides
to opt for an u-turn. The road ahead
is black with ice, and now the snow arrives:
reminds him of minefields. When in Iraq

:

Rather than spit it out
he writes it down and hands it
to some Richard Burton type
who doesn’t have the crackle
of a congested chest
but breath enough
for long sentences

:

His face has changed but not his voice,
I’d recognize it anywhere:
a rowdy bar; a quiet prayer.
‘Hold on’ he’d said when carrying Joyce
through flames and smoke then through a door

:

They’re on the prowl and fire at will:
sharp shooting boys with pellet guns;
they’re tall and slim and short on brains.

It’s cats and dogs and window panes