fold your arms
And purse your lips
Bow your back
To droop your ****.
Sidle eyes and make them slits.

Now tilt your head
And raise each lid
Slowly now
Do as I bid.
Raise your eyebrows
Sigh and frown
Look the creature up and down.

Fold your arms and make a barrier
This is working - she's a worrier.
How's it feel to make her cower?
How's it feeling - all that power?

Did you rise up in your chair?
Is all you want before you there?
Slam the desk, now point the finger
Hurry up. No time to linger.
You've got her now
Make her squirm
Show her what she's got to learn.

Lean back again
The lesson's over.You've made your point,
She's learned to cower.
Know your place and stay in role
Wait for this to take its toll.

how sad is the papered wall
Of a half demolished house.
Square patches of fade
Where beloved pictures were
And flapping ends
Flicking in the breeze.
Open for all to see
And cold now
In winter's winds.
Coloured paper
Stuck to crumbling brick
Like lipstick on a wrinkled mouth
Or rouge on creepy cheeks.

Why does the sweet bird's trill
So lift my heart above the petty judgements that I make
So little based on truth, but rooted
In my own self- seeking?

The song he sings finds harmony in me
And let's me soar with him.

Rising with his simple air
I too can touch the sky.
Reminding me
That flesh and sinew
Hair and bone and teeth
Have underneath
A light and weightless thing
That soars
To hear a blackbird sing.

it operates like a glass ceiling
But is more often self- constricted.
It can come in a set;
One inside the other,
Inside another.

Some people are able to move
From the smaller to the larger.
There are no hinged sides
And any movement will cause shattering of glass
And sharp edges.

Sometimes after a breakthrough others follow.
They can see the shards of glass
And avoid them.

At first the glass sides are clean and clear
But they become clouded
By those breathing the stultifying air.

Those who grow inside the box
Become distorted
By its restrictions
And find their faces flattened against its sides.

Sometimes the box is a lonely place to be.

For those who leave
There's no return.

The air outside the box is rarified
And keeps one
gasping.

Two large bubbles floating
Collide
And merge in the space they share;
A friendship.

Hands held
and eyes caught.

Holding together as the bubble bounces
Keeping the balance, knees bent, bodies arched
Changing shape to accommodate the movement
Moving together ; eye to eye.

Eyes drift,look away
Space shrinks
Bubbles separate
And drift away.

Tackle thonged
Condensed in shimmering lurex.
Flamboyance bursts from flaming wig,
From feathered lashes and from fuscia lips.

Eyes flash and teeth sparkle
In the huge face.

With Cherokee cheekbones and a Roman nose
A pantomime dame becomes a slinky Cher,
A strutting Turner and a slick Minnelli,
Before settling
Into the loose and comfortable robes of a Boy George
We hope has found peace.
We clap and sing,
'Kama, Kama, Kama, Kama , Kama chameleon,'
As this chameleon
Plays out his life story for our entertainment.
And old ladies cheer
And wish him well.

In the dying heat of a Spanish September
Wrought iron gates guard the bar's flagged patio.
Plastic flowers defy the night and sit up stiffly in their baskets on the concrete wall.
No horses tethered here among the motor scooters.

Inside
An imposing counter guards the rooms beyond.
As brightly lit as a dental surgery and amply served by whirling ceiling fans.
The chiselled features of Native American Braves look down from the faded paintings that line magnolia walls,
Their steely gaze perplexed.
No pale faces here among the white man,
Just white hair
Or burnished copper shimmering like the painted desert.
Here the white woman wears the war paint.
Piped music circa 1960 jingles just Out of earshot
And a queue for bingo forms as a quiz is finishing.
Everyone has cheated,
Mouthing answers with a mixture of pride and cameraderie
Not too much of either,
Tepid
Luke warm
Like the night outside.

'Two little Ducks'.
No answering claim
'Old Ireland;17'
'No 3. Gone for a ***.'
'House!'
Then silence.

The plain matron reading out the numbers enunciates carefully into her microphone,
'And the next house is for the jackpot.'
Silence.
The queue slowly forms again. Banal lyrics from the teenage tunes fill in the gaps in stilted conversation
Long dead warriors watch, bewildered
And the night wears on.