I am in a room made of glass, sorry,
let me clarify,
the walls and doors are glass,
the carpet is woven by a machine where the workers are limited to toilet breaks,

the plants are plastic in pots of gravel

but the walls are glass and everyone can see in and I can see out.

The table is shaped like a kidney, don't ask me why, it just is, manufactured by a factory making furniture shaped like human organs.

That's the shape of the table, I can't change that,

and the chairs are moulded from one piece of plastic, in bright colours and people look in through glass walls.

I look out and I am really not there.

An appetite for wildlife they said.
hundreds of heads on the wall,
the smallest to the left,
the head of an ant
and on the right
the largest,
his finest ****,
stalked day and night for weeks,

finally brought to ground with a bazooka, a steady hand and some luck:
the head of a great blue whale.

And in between them,
a cat -
a giraffe and
a couple of celebrity chefs
mounted,
with eyes as black as the
finest caviar,
staring.

The moving van pulled up blocking out the sun, stopping right outside my window.

The house next door had been empty for a few weeks now. I was intrigued to see who would be moving in.

I opened the front door and made some up some excuse so I could walk to the end of my drive and have a look.

To see what was happening.

From the angle I was at, all I could see was the ramp at the back of the truck.

Descending down the ramp came a family of apes, carrying a variety of ornate furniture.

The dad looked over his shoulder,

looked me straight in the eyes,"Hello there, I'm Mr Johnson".

He then put down the lampshade, reached out, and with his long simian fingers proceeded to try and remove (imaginary) tics from my hair.
I stepped back and he offered his hand for me to shake.

Shake it I did.

And the lampshade he was carrying was delightful. It would have matched my curtains and I turned away, jealous.

I will endeavour to write poems free from arcane references to impotent religious figures or dead poets.

There will be no Latin quotes in italics. I want you to read my poetry aloud, not one handed, eyes on a dictionary, scratching your head.

I will not use words such as nape when referring to a neck. Or describe skin as soft, delicate, porcelain.

I will avoid romance and love (lost, unrequited or otherwise) and abstain from pretty descriptions of landscapes, trees and flowers gracefully bending in the breeze.

Where possible I will avoid cliche.

I will write about estates, cracked pavements Presidential assignations, machines, clowns in places they shouldn't be.

Flawed people,
shopping trolleys.

she used her date of birth as grid references – found that place on a map
circled it like with black marker pen
circling ***** *******
inky areola
- days spent staring at black rings

go for the atlas they yelled like an audience on a gameshow - explore the cities that are lost under the staples -
explore the curves of geography - dip your toes in the water - bathing sharks show teeth sharp -

and when she got home the librarian removed the snippets of conversation from her waistband -

she laid them end to end to construct her resignation letter

She faked her own death
and is believed to be buried
beneath the fourth runway
by the new apartments
fire engine red doors
over there:
the sunset is dripping
on to chewing gum pavements

in the window
a silhouette of her ******* prove
that she's alive, amongst silly revolutionaries,
aviators
avatars
and questionable friendships.

Scandinavian diets are seen by the satellites.

I dream of rigged lacrosse matches
won in 4th quarter
overtime

of chess games won with en passant
(what exactly is that?)
of horses falling at the first hurdle.

I dream of Martian landscapes
through sand-dunes of heartache
because as a child, at McDonalds
I was never allowed a milk shake,

while in my waking hours I have
absolved a multitude of sins for
lapsed nuns, ringmasters and troubadours.

I have filmed riots,
marathons and abortions.

I have seen things
pickled in jars
holding open heavy doors.

I have tried,
like an idiot
to commit all this to
memory.