There is a strange quality
That infects beautiful people.
Marilyn Monroe is a perfect example-
It is the quality of other-worldliness,
Convincing us
That this idol transcends the mundane
And become something holy,
Untouchable
Wholly untouchable,
Their beauty circling us,
Dreamily,
Slowly.

Tom,
Despite being the most beautiful
Creature most people have ever clapped eyes on,
Does not possess this quality.
In fact,
It is the absence of it
That makes his beauty
All the more unreal.
He is so lodged into the fabric of
Existence that even the colour of his eyes
(Which have been compared to the sky so many times
It has ceased to be a cliché)
Do not look like the sky,
They are the sky,
His pupil a black sun
Stuck in the way.
His furious storm of hair is the
Golden brown of fine malt whiskey,
You can get drunk on every strand,
And you can chart the seas
From the white half-moons
On the fingernails of his hands.

(He flutters behind the bar like a drunken hummingbird,
The gold paint on his face
Turning him into an off-duty statue from Covent Garden.

He turns to address the crowd of customers.)

“Right – roll up, roll up –
Come see the Brick Lane-ologists favourite mixologist,
I’m a cocktail maker and occasional drug taker,
I can do things with gin that’ll make your head spin…”

He begins to juggle with three glass bottles,

“I’m your loyal bartender and I take any legal tender…”

he sets the bottles on the bar top with a grin,

*“And I’m at your pleasure…for just two quid a measure.”