****
a finger on glass
as two animals

in the tank
begin to dance,
sepia tong-like claws

moving every which way,
an aquatic side-step
or frenetic tango,

slimy bodies
as though mossy rocks
come to life

before settling again,
their pin-***** eyes
on your giant irises.

Getting back into the car
after buying
cookies from Asda,

a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it
little bundle of brown,
there I say, on the fence.

Marbles for eyes,
tail like a question mark,
hair the shade

of twenty sunsets.
I point it out,
body half-bowed

as if to whisper hello
before bounding away,
swallowed by the leaves.

On the ceiling
or creeping out from behind
the radiator,

six brittle legs,
a body round as a
black Jelly Tot

or a miniature cylinder,
just enough to make you          jump
or eject

a shriek from your mouth,
this one double-clawed
creature you scoop up

with a cup, delicately
in case of a sudden scuttle, pop
back outside among the marigolds.

And so,
as if the final
of the feline high jump,

our neighbour’s pet, piebald,
getting on in years,
sits on her side,

surveys its challenge.
Then, as if the crumpling
of ink-splodged paper,

she crouches, half
Fosbury-flops herself
up to the post, plops down

into our garden,
merrily saunters
across the rain-tickled grass.

As you launch
the mottled sphere
(no longer luminous yellow

after many a capture)
with a flick of the wrist,
all the neighbours would see

is a streak of black,
a charcoal bullet
between the trees

as your friend on four legs
fizzes after its prize,
jams it in the mouth,

lollops back to you with rapid pants,
clump of slobber, a monosyllabic
can I do it again.

we eat strawberries at the table
in our underwear and the television
tells us we’re at war again, by which
I mean not specifically us, but you
know what I mean. I have left last
night’s still half-full glasses by the sink
because we might go back to them
and the drink itself was expensive
enough. As you pick another ruby
***** from the bowl I think
I get it now, how not to be
jealous of others, of their closed doors
intimacy. It’s different when you’re in it,
head-first, sugar-rushed, red-mouthed.
There is rain forecast for today;
already pewter clouds are behind
the windows which means any plans
we might have made are almost certainly
scuppered, but at least the two
of us are together, for now if not forever,
I suppose you can never really tell.

I must be in one
of those funny moods again
(if funny’s even the right word)
          the images easy enough to pick from
          whether rinsed grey
          or blooming maroon
the sky somebody else took
midnight blue
with stardust pentameter
          I’m thinking of cold water
          you don’t mind bathing in
          somewhere in Scandinavia
a voice, yours or the last album
we listened to drifting to us
as we break the lake’s membrane
          and if not that (you’ll see)
          my indecision hasn’t wavered)
          a dress, a road,
a photographer whose name matters little
in a silent stretch of land
I’m half-dreaming of
          and I wish this isn’t some
          toxic desperation with its ginger sting
          galloping to the fore
but the words already here
collapse like trains of dominoes
in my head you wouldn’t see what I can