Someone with the authority to do so
Had tended a toppled bollard
With black bin liner.
The University slope recalled,
Of all places,
Aberystwyth.
Stethoscope antlers peeked
Ostentatiously
Out of white coat pockets.
High-rises everywhere,
As inscrutable as people
You will never see inside.
It jerks and rumbles through the blue,
Hauling night-capped sitters
Over seven time-zones.
They emerge rubbing bleary sun,
Breathing forgotten toothpaste.
Clock hands are all out of whack,
If anything slipping slyly back,
And the taxi red in a breakfast noon.
That night it’s 3am, or 7pm,
Dinner: broccoli, salmon, spaghetti!
The routine buoys him,
The rhythm looses,
And floating on homeward foam,
He departs a nameless jetty.
She had the face
Of someone on the cusp
Of fame,
Eyes vying for space with cheeks,
Eyes very convex, like fishbowls
Granted centrepiece,
Granted the entire sweep of
Her adoring oglers.
Her trousers were maroon leather;
I thought it clever how they matched her handbag.
Whisking up the northern line,
An egg in every seat;
I’d like to crack their stipples shells
To get at that white meat.
Whisking up the northern line,
An egg has cracked itself;
The kind of egg my mother has
Me put back on the shelf.
Whisking up the northern line,
One clucks into its phone;
This egg will make bad omelettes
And underglaze a scone.
Shorter Poems 