Cross Country

We have left the Brighton to London

Commuter line

And are travelling cross country

No longer heading for the city

The carriage is quiet, nearly empty

And outside an early frost

And watercolour sky

I spoke too soon

Into the carriage pour

A hundred school or more

School children

Why do they shout?

Why such loud conversation?

Why are their voices so shrill?

The cacophony and impatience

of the i-phone generation

Oh, where is the quiet girl, reading a book?

Where are the two boys engrossed in chess,

Where is the boy with the nervous glances
And unrequited fantasies?

Forecast

The guillemot

Gazes at the sky

And hopes

That today’s weather report

Will be more accurate

Than yesterday’s

Artisan

Her hands,

large, but delicate.

Her fingernails,

Bitten, cracked, unadorned.

She is painting an old,

French, sanded-down headboard,

Antique gold.

Why is she painting so meticulously,

Her face, masked in concentration?

I knew you would come, she said,

As she removed her apron

And, naked, moved through the cold room

Towards me

The Night of the Knives

In the Pizza Express

The young man on the next table

Asks the waitress

Do you have the new knives?

She says, We are supposed to have them by now

But they haven’t arrived yet

The young man continues,

Because I was in Stratford the other day…

He lets the sentence hang

And does a cutting pizza mime

Then, as she walks away he says,

They’re one hundred times better.

Counting Spiders

Six mischievous spiders

Tumble out of the dice shaker

One has the gift of healing

One is poisonous

One is drunk on fly brandy

One is a loser

One has no redeeming characteristics whatsoever

And one can never stop cracking jokes

It’s your move.