alas
a loss
unless
undressed
the poor old
chap was loved
I guess
her curls
in swirls
around his chest       ..

we rented a room
so cold we went to bed
with our clothes on,
but not for long

she says these poems are
****, but what if she’s right   ..

glad I never met george orwell
since he’d have despised me for
being a weak liberal and well
yeah he’d have been about right

people find me cold,
which is also
how they leave me

lived in lewisham for a while
it was alright  
but then she grew bored and I grew
bored with her growing bored
and staying out all night
and south east london ain’t the end of the
world

only writing because
like bukowski said
only if you have to
will it be any good

wanted to knock on his door
and ask him to come out to play
but what if his dad answered
and what if he said, oh ok  ..

sitting at a pavement table
   of a turkish café
  near the gare de l’est

feel myself hunch
  like a dishevelled pigeon
over lunch, the waiter

asks for our order,
     naturally in french
and I ask “parlez vous anglais?”

     he enquires if we’re dutch,
               or quite possibly deutsch    ..
guess it doesn’t matter much

don’t like restaurants
are full of people
who could have stayed
at home and cooked

when I was a kid I got a sixpence
a week for
pocket money, plus the beano
every
saturday
and then, suddenly, they
brought in decimalisation
and a sixpence no longer existed,
and I’ve worried about
money
ever since   ..

I’m drunk
feel your

contempt
so not

quite drunk
enough     ..

used to think I’d like
to get to know you,
but I don’t, anymore

your underwears me down
with it’s expectation of
fulfilment, but I’m just not in the mood
right now I’m reading

people often say “less”
when they mean “fewer” -
it’s not important, I
guess, it’s just grammar    ..

jumps out of bed
what have you done
  with my ******* she says
I’m late for work
  
they’re on the floor
  next to my socks
if I recall aright
     last night  ..

why call murderers butchers,
    when we get our lamb chops
from the butchers, and very nice they are, too
    few, those old shops   ..

she said I wonder
what you look like
without your glasses

he said I wonder
what you look like
without my glasses    ..

they say a time machine wouldn’t
be possible
but that’s *******
I’ve got a clock