I've always had a fondness for gingers.
Don't ask me why.
Maybe it's the hair,
Whether it's sunset orange,
Dark auburn
Strawberry blonde
Or just plain red,
I love it.
But there is something within the people themselves
That just makes me go awwrr
And makes me want to hug the affected person,
Affected meaning, well,
Gingered.
That's a verb, right?
For example,
My three-year-old brother is a ginger, the only one in the family.
I like to call him any of the following:
Ginger Baby
Little Ginger
Baby Ging'
And really, really cute.
You've got to love gingers.

“Never trust a ginger”
she sings giggling looking at the red head next to me.
Her song is a pretty good representation of our friendship.
Throw in a ***** bump and some dorky dance moves
oh yea
that’s the definition of our friendship.
Laughing and dying at things no one else gets
actions no one else see’s
and mouthed words no one else understands.
That’s just a little inside view of our *“love”.

“Never kiss a ginger”
It’s a little late for that don’t ya think
blackberry tea and coffee making her laugh till she dies.
Hysterics that break her down till she’s on the floor rolling
rolling down a hill and being so dizzy she can’t get up.
Oh but she’s a monster that chases you around
trying to tackle you to the ground.
Falling off the playground rail and hitting her head
just like in our story
so she lays there laughing hysterically.
All I can do is shake my head

“Never kiss a ginger…twice”
yea that’s a little better.
he won’t be telling my slightly stunned, amazed face its cute again.
The face we later joked about
mouth dropped to the floor
eyes wide.
Like did that seriously just happen.
Our dumb and quirky reactions to everything
exaggerated, excited yeses
and happy little dances.


"Never date a ginger”
I’m not nor have I ever…
where do you get these thoughts that run through your head?
Ok I can’t say much
my mind wanders to the strangest places
and leads us to the greatest conversations.
Like cops on bikes with prisoners in baskets
leading to Mortal Instruments characters all riding one bike.
I’ve no idea where our minds get these strange ideas and imaginings.

“Never love a ginger”
I never said I love him
don’t let your mind wander
dangerous things happen when our minds wander
anywhere from dinosaurs ruling the world to death
and the things in between are sometimes worse to think about

“Never like a ginger”
OI!
with this again
I don’t I promise there’s nothing there
now please shut up.
Yes, yes I love you now please don’t attack my legs again
I really don’t feel like falling on the floor
it’s not very appealing.
Uh-oh

I've always liked gingers
But I've never met a ginger I liked until you.
Your flaming hair echoes my desire.

I once again write this poem in time,
as the hands tick with the clock.
To take a stand and declare, that surely
"Redheads Rock!"

Blondes may have some fun, and
brunettes can put up fight.
Now we come more bold and brave,
as our flags wave "Gingers Unite!"

Don't think we will be bullied.
We will defend our honor as our duty.
Too all the coppers, golden, orange,reds...
and to I - the "Auburn Beauty!"

i have absolutely no qualms when it comes to working
with women...
but let's face it... in this profession...
all the thrills are gone when women have joined
our ranks:
when once upon a time this was an exclusively masculine
profession...
there's so much less chance for violence,
also thrills... which makes life: livable...
bearable... but unsatisfying to the eternal quest
of man's: ooh... what's there?! what's that?
domesticated licking a wound that has yet to be
inflicted...
             i'm bored... and every other one is
having some mental health crisis...
               the asylum imploded and the worms
are wriggling out to be unable to see the sun...
i was paired up with this poor little thing today...
why do women trust me to the point
of revelling in revealing all their personal problems?
i don't get it...
am i a ******* psychologist on the side?
do i have a rubber ear or something?
  sure... i'll listen: but i'm asking myself...
              every time i ask to be placed on either turnstiles
or where the action is... i get the easy shift
at Fulham... in Bishop's Park... which is a doodle...
which is a yawn...
   but my "supposed" supervisor... Emma...
she once dyed her hair acid green... now she's
fluorescent purple...
           hmm... women and hair colour...
when i was younger... i had this archetypical
burn for blondes...
    i was obsessed with a girl named Milena...
a girl named Samantha... a girl named Janina...
all of them: blondes...
           ***** blondes... blondes of all types...
     but now?
               god almighty: restrain me! gingers!
i finally reached an argument to find this current
girl... 5ft... something or other...
only today i managed to spot her ***...
tight... small... firm... almost like a Christmas
present...
but this little ginger number is unlike
my prior ginger investment...
   this one's not whiskey hued... auburn... darkened
ginger...
this is a lighter shade...
                the same pale skin...
but she's more prone to patches of freckles...
i'm going mad over gingers...
      i can't help myself... there's something so appealing
about these remnants of the Celtic...
you work with women... and... somehow...
you working together they start treating
it like it's your first ******* date...
can't i just be coupled with a guy and talk about
Heidegger's hammer?!
they're good people...
            but... i really don't want to work in an environment
of autobiographical context...
i'm here: to do X... by the time Y comes around
and we clock out... i'm Z: on my way home...
looking for a shop that's open that still sells beer...
the **** i hear i should be paid double...
i get it though... i get it...
i'm human... we're supposed to share our little
stories... i was paired with a girl that finally allowed me
to open up...
i'm guessing there's a Whatts-Up group...
i've been hearing the same ******* questions from
about 6 different women...
today i explored the fact that:
yes, i've been engaged... she broke it up with me and
is now on her second marriage...
do you have kids? to be honest? i don't know....
which is sort of funny...
even if i have i will never know about them...
why are you the only child?!
oh, you know... i was born two weeks after Chernobyl...
even my grandparents remember that spring...
you had streaks of autumn hues in the trees...
my mother didn't have a second child because
she feared... because of my birthmark
on my right shoulder blade... since removed...
she might have ***** mutations... bring forth Siamese twins...
a burden...
            nature is cruel: so should man's intellect...
be likewise...
          hey presto... what did we pass?
a piece of a bird... well... a bit of the torso and a wing...
where's the rest? sort of fits into the narrrative
of... me having a piece of flesh removed from
my shoulder-blade... with an overgrowth of muscle
around the collar-bone...
i just want to be in the stadium...
where the action is...
i get ******* put on the easy shift...
'i want to work with Matthew!'
               they are seriously sussing me out...
all of them... single mums...
i don't believe any of these women are single...
   my "supervisor" keeps nagging me about...
when i misheard her...
she said: hello DARLING...
i thought she said: hello DADDY...
   now i'm ******* Daddy... she just keeps on nagging
me about mishearing the word...
i listen to music on full volume...
i should be deaf by now...
                but she can't let it go...
in the background she has these weird
mobile conversations concerning family courts...
she's in the process of being divorced...
most of these women have dated... dated...
reproduced with absolute *******...
   and that's my problem, now?!
                  now? it's a bit like that sccene
at the funeral of Ernest Menville in: Death Becomes Her...
he lived... the better best days of his life
after 35... after... all that crap...
it's a sick ******* ploy...
   why am i working this easy shift?
  
   oh... right... somewhere down the middle
my supervisor turns into my mother in need of painkillers
complaining about backpains...
i know where this leads...
women give birth... the ultimate pain:
couldn't we just bypass the whole drama and give
them a Cesarean?
oh right... then the Bible would be all wong: wrong;
women would not have to give
birth in agony... sorry... sowwy...
m'ah b'ah... b'ah... bad...
costs too much: mind you...

but what the **** am i? a ******* hugging-slot-machine?!
we're working, no?
so... why am i hugging these women on their
whim?!
one of my ex-girlfriends warned me about this:
i know, i know i am not a godsend for women...

do... plumbers hug when at work?!
do plumbers hug? it's like that meme:
can two straight men share an umbrella?!
i get it... being friendly... fair ******* enough...
but... a woman approaches you...
kisses you on the cheek... hugs you...
hell... she can get away with it...
       because of man's constant "hard-on"...
but... do that in reverse and what do you get?!

i'm as lucky as i'm unlucky...
the women that surround me?!
   they share stories of men treating them like ****...
see... that's the problem...
when you're a man with too many interests
from women... you sort of become a woman...
because... women start treating you like ****...
you sort of become their dumping ground...
let's see what we can get away with...
i'm pretty sure they don't know that i frequent
brothels...
   i'm going to get paid tomorrow...
Thursday... another shift... come Friday?
i'm going to text Khedra and get my *******
****** off...

                but this one ginger tonight...
she's a curious little thing... i know she is...
we were about to stand down...
    the "supervisor" already called it in... since the crowd
was dispersing...
but what did this: new cutie ginger in my life
do? she drags me for a one-on-one into the park...
to "check": optics...
   i'm not going to brag...
    i love women... which implies: i don't want to understand
them...
i love women too much to want to understand them...
and i do see it... some guys have no ******* chance...
you have bad teeth? or no teeth?
no chance... bad hair? i.e. oily... not washed...
no chance...
            bad posture? no chance...
not ironed shirts or trousers? no chance...
sorry... not calm enough? no chance...
                           nature is cruel... so should be man's intellect...
it should be like sandpaper when
all you want to ask for it... gliding your hand
across a body of water...
no no... that's not going to happen...
    time to roughen up...
                 i need sand under my *******
while i rub rub a... ha ha... an "SOS"...
                   working with women is weird...
even my father once exclaimed...
yeah... saw a female bricklayer...
    i'm not sure if she was a butch type of lesbian...
she must have been i remarked...
that's how homosexual relationships work...
they still return to the dynamic of:
someone's going to be masculine while
the other is going to be feminine... no?
           surrogate ******* the medium:
which is ******* harsh... i could be blasted for frequenting
brothels... but... surrogate ******* is...
akin to boxing: a punch below the ******* belt...
that's... not ******* with the ****...
but ******* with the womb...
that's ******* harsh...
                    
    every single ******* time i work with these
women i'm suspect... i'm always ******* dating...
i don't want to date...
i want to work...
            no... no work here...
cuddling... ugh...
                but this one ginger number...
the one that dragged me for the optical illusion
of being in the right place at the right time...
what a tight ***...
again: when i was younger... the archetypical blondes...
but as i've aged... gingers...
Celtic beauties...
    an antithesis of...
                Cerdic & the Saxons in the film King Arthur...
gingers... i'm starting to build up
a fetish for them...
they ooze... beside the clot of freckles...
that... mmm... milk-prowess-synonym of their...
tender... skin...
              
    no... sorry... i'm sort of blinded...
"work" has become sort of become sort of a schoolyard...
girls on boys
boys on girls...
                 what a load of *******...
i tried it with one ginger... Valentine's flowers...
crard... banana loaf... home-made-wine...
not good enough... not complicated enough...
   vinyl collection? not good enough...
well ******* not good enough...
           there's always another ginger in the poker-hand...
mind you: her *** looks... hmm... better than yours...

what a pretty little thing...
if i managed to give her the blushes...
i'm sure...
i'm pretty ******* sure...
i'd see as many freckles as i'd see on a Dalmatian!
like i said:
i love women too much to not want to understand them...

oh man... this ginger cutie...
what else? if not a single mum...
instead of a hug she dragged me into having a one-on-one
convo with me...
    oh sure... it's great... in the "upper tier"...
but it's not like they settle for you...
you're in the leftover crowd...
   chasing forever the middle ground...
  
            the safety net of...
                  it's nice seeing those ringed fellas running
around with problems...
i'm not joining the club...
                      dying all alone... in a hospital...
can't be that bad... learning from my grandfather:
compared to living a life of absolute misery for over 40 years...
no... thanks...
    as long as i'm desired...
better... than being kept by one ******* sparrow-sing-along.

I was like the jungle king,
She was like the jungle queen,
She was running ****,
Except wearing those flowers,
And I was wearing the waves,
That kissed me otherwise ****.

All those strange creatures on the beach,
They all ignored us for burning together,
Burning for sin,
Craving for sin,
Like the reptiles being swallowed by their dens,
The **** of a man,
Kissing the pit of a woman,
The evolution of thirst,
The ******* of burst,
Everything protected by the transparent curtains of water.

She was like the jungle queen,
I was like the jungle king,
I was ******* her crude,
Except my censored spermatozoon blushing out,
And she was nowhere to consume,
My sapid feelings in her faked frame.

How lovely is the freckle upon the fire child,
How beautiful are these sun kisses.
What a summer that transpires under blue eyes,
What virtuous hands to clasp mine in camaraderie.
To all the sparks, the red heads, the gingers, the orange licks of heat:
Continue to burn, for it is amazing to see.

this was today:

a splendid breakfast, ****** black intestines...
whatever the hell they put in those...
pig brain cartilage, blood, liver... barley...
fried with some onions, eaten with a decently toasted bread...
then... figuring out what to do with the ****-show
in the garden, three trips to the recycling centre
with rotten timber, and, some spare parts...

conversations with father...
football, the Grand National... i hate myself for this...
i'm not a gambling man...
but each year like clocks go back come the winter
months and like clocks go forward come the summer
months... i place a bet on the Grand National...
a bit like Harold Norse might have claimed
at not being a man... i'm not a man...
i don't gamble... i hate gambling...
today proved my point...
   yet again...
         i don't know how Bukowski or Dostoyevsky
managed a habit... i'd much rather work some
menial work and... then... yeah "gamble" with
a *******... gambling for me is more the thrill
of the unexpected than: expecting to fall-flat on my face...
having unprotected ***... but... just checking:
she might inform me... a ****** doesn't make
a lot of difference... if... you're not smarting-up
with your hygiene... so i get the exclusive no ******
******* into her... that's gambling...
a different sort of gambling...
  i'm the horse and the jockey...
the bet? oh... that's somewhere in the back of my mind
when i pay for an hour...
whatever... i'm a man and i'm not a man
in how the normal man would rather place a bet
on a horse than... have unprotected *** with a *******...
all... or nothing... that's me...
because i'm so ******* with myself...
i only bet a £1 on this one horse... each way...
so even if he came in 5th... i'd get a return...
so each way implies: a £1 bet you cough up £2...
for security... and he was running so splendidly for
about 28 fences... at times first... at times third...
****** gave up... after the last fence...
came in 6th...

     but what's frustrating about betting on horses...
or football teams...
like with this girl Jeminah... single mum...
bankrupt / a bad credit score...
i get these wrong sort of butterflies in my stomach...
when i start courting her...
drop round... one time... twice...
i promise her a bottle of homemade wine...
well... first "date" we just talk... job issues...
i already know she's bullshitting about me behind
my back... i keep a watch... second date
i bring the wine and some banana loaf that i too
have made... i'm getting these stomach crunches:
this is such a good idea! my ego-phallus is demanding...
but... my digestive system is rebelling against me:
check again...
   i had this ****** on a line and sinker!
if only i had the sort of intestines that might warn me...
about what could be or couldn't be
a good bet... i had him in my sight!
the Grand National Winner!
   i had him... there's no logic to gambling...
but this time around there sort of was...
   if i could only have the gut feelings in-tune with a
winner... like i might... with a female: loser-project...
*******, cycling drunk to her house...
leaving flowers in the middle of the night...
hot-head me... well... yeah...
you go to prostitutes from time to time...
you're going to get a hot-head...
               ******* ginger lasses...
                       but if i can get these right sort
of sensations concerning women...
who the hell cares if i don't get the same sensations
when it comes to horses, running for a gamble?
long-term projects... i like those...
i'd much prefer earning an honest wage
than winning some spare cash on the sly...
i hate gambling...
   but i ******* had him!
             i was looking through the list...
   Longhouse Poet: 14 - 1... poet... poet...
                  poets... Irish poets... W. B. Yeats...
why didn't my gut find my brains? i asked my father
on one of our trips to the recycling centre...
chances of a 7 year old winning it?
i heard... not since 1940?
  no... no chance, he replied... what about the 13 year old?
Blaklion - last time a 13 year old won
the Grand National was back in 1923...
but i had this Noble Yeats... **** me... 50 - 1 on my mind...
i was thinking... Longhouse Poet... Poet...
Yeats! come on!
  see... this is why i hate gambling...
i get the proper gut feelings when it comes to women...
no... she's no good... three ******* days of
constant stomach crunching without doing
any crunches... constipation... ooh... i'd love to simply
**** her: but... she's of that sort of age
where... a casual fling isn't simply going to cut it...
can't i just replace these gut-wrenches when
it comes to betting on the right horse...
just once a year... i had the ******... in my grasp!
there was also this horse: Freewheelin Dylan...
but... Bob Dylan is a lyricist...
   he's not the Dylan Thomas... so... three poet horses...
i just sort of ******* knew...
but... money muddles judgement...
unless... it concerns prostitutes...
    because that's what gambling has replaced:
the old religious superstitions...
talk of demons is equivalent to the talk of luck...
to hell with it...
              the same old religious superstitions have
been usurped by secular gambling habits!
so... why do i get these gut feelings of repulsion
i first think of as infatuation: rightly so...
oh... she was a cougar i'd love to pass...
why can't i focus that sort of gut sensations
when it comes to betting on the winning horse?
easy money...inherit a mountain:
without how many pebbles it takes to give
a mountain its form...
     maybe i'm lucky... in that respect...
     maybe life has allowed me to... hmm... see:
the bigger picture...
    if i can cough up for one hour living dangerously
with a *******... and... this sort of woman...
is not shoving me her offspring down
my throat... while's she's looking for
beta-bucks deluxe... i think that's better than
betting on a winning horse...
  give me the menial task... forget it...
earning money: freely... easily...
         but... i'd love that Spiderman sort
of sensation on a good bet...
mind you: i had a good-sensation... a premonition...
i just listened to bad advice...
with women? i don't listen to any advice...
i just... cruise... automatically solo...
     but thank god i only gamble with a quid's worth
once a year... i had W. B. Yeats in my mind...
ugh! it's so frustrating!
   like with the women in my life...
the mares keep nodding: upon approach at the first
hurdle... last hurdle... the image of:
pretending to sniff my eyelashes...
          the horse is looking for: side-lining it to:
side-lining "blinkers"... no good...
this... custard... is fresh?!
              stay up to 1am... wake up 20 minutes prior
to 8am... have a croissant and coffee at Putney Bridge...
before the lazy-assed Somalis: depending...
decide to... feel important...
which is never... fair enough...
Thames goes down to glue...
          i hate gambling...
                i never gamble...
this is what it might possibly feel like not having written
Crime & Punishment...
which, given the current year?
feels... pretty ******* good! oh, no...
no high-brow type of motivation to keep
the European literary up-keep of "culture"...
that load of *******... is long gone...
enter African: grime... enter... horse-****-imitation-sludge.

that way yesterday:

just at my annual check-up with the nurse...
the woman sat there, amazed...
although still worried about my high-blood pressure...
we agreed... no matter the diet:
i avoid fruit, i don't like too much sugar...
i prefer eating vegetables...
come to think of it... only yesterday i ate a...
medium-rare slice of beef with nothing
but salt, pepper... some toasted sourdough...
i was going to make myself a creamy mushroom
sauce with too much parsley...
but i was like: n'ah... not going to happen...
i'm a puritan when it comes to beef...
less is more...
i even told my mother: in it for the calories...
i don't care what it is...
like Socrates once said:
some people eat to live...
while others: live to eat... i'm of the former
persuasion... but don't get me wrong...
i like the chemistry experiments that go around
cooking up a decent curry...
work was fun, always is...
i'm always very, hardly: talkative...
unless i'm probed... tickled... in the right way...
after being rejected by Jeminah...
that auburn... conker... beau...
                       my god... after being rejected by her...
i've built up a fetish for gingers...
sure... the mythological blonde...
the Turkic raven hair black...
   but gingers... and Gaelic...
   i feel like an elder Saxon coming to these shores
when i see that pale skin, those freckles...
i see ginger i turn into a bull that charges
against: fuchsia... because bulls never charge
against prime colours...
like red... bull charge against a hue of something
between red and purple... almost UV...
fluorescent... fuchsia... is a hue: it's not a colour...
per se... since it mingle red with purple...
or... is it blue?
           i've learned that rejection by something
specific makes me more predatory if other similar
examples proper their heads up...
ginger girls... pale skin... freckles...
i'm ******* zoning in... cruising... circling...
but it's not my fault if women find me intimidating...
this one at work... oh my god...
if she was 20 years prior... from Dublin...
i already told her: i have a James Joyce hard-on...
what did we talk about? her working in a care-home
with dementia patients... Gaelic...
like i had this friend once... her name was:
spoken: N-E-E-V... kneeve in English...
that's already adding letters: not said... the surd K...
but... how was her name spelled?
******* Niamh... Niamh said is... *******
Neave?! she loved learning French, i hated it...
merde... again... what's that loose E doing in that word?
that's what i love about ****** spreschen...
distinct syllable, distinction between vowels and
consonants...
westerners tell us: too many consonants! too many!
the easterners might counter with:
TOO, MANY, *******, VOWELS!
i can't see what you're about to say if
you write one way, but speak another!
   but my nurse was very much shocked...
two years ago i weighed in at 117.9kg...
she weighed me today... 98,7kg...
        lean, slim, pretty *******: i dare say...
what did we talk about?
oh... that blood pressure "thing": it runs in the family...
144 / 96... the second measure is about...
circulation or something... the first can be high,
that's good... means you're pumping...
problem with her middle child...
   the elder son managed to buy a house...
the middle child is having issues... i choked about being
the only child... and... well... with me?
it would have to become borderline patricide...
i think she got the joke...
   the son gets along with his younger sister...
blah blah...
then... on a scale of 0 to 5...
depression and... anxiety...
the anxiety questions i put back to her:
do i look anxious?
   depression? can i use the term melancholy?
my grandfather died "recently":
i'm sort of churning out... being reflective concerning
mortality... how's that?
i cycle like a madman... well... that was lovely...
just watching her face... behind that 2021 *****...
how did i do it? walked at first... marathon lengths...
to St. Paul's and back...
  then i got on my bicycle...
but... you see... i had this friend... he was a big too...
but he avoided doing cardiovascular exercise...
hit the gym... later? problems with loose skin...
it takes time... cardiovascular exercises tones you:
since you're applying repeated strain...
you're not trying to bulge up...
you can't turn fat into protein mass...
you need to burn the fat off... then you can start
building up protein mass...
and... repeated strain... is more important than...
just pumping iron...

They are both orange or gingers, as in my dreams
both crazy and funny, like you and me
and in our faces, in the morning, they won't scream.

In the apartment we'll never split rent together,
between the rooms we'll never kiss in
the kitchen we'll never cook in, not for each other.

The litter boxes we won't take turns to clean
the food bowls we won't refill, like you and I never did
wiping mirrors until they glisten and gleam
and looking back now, it's a relief indeed

The bills we won't compute, pay and solve,
the fights that we'll never have.
I find comfort in our inexistent marital issues
and the divorce that we'll never have to encounter.

I'm thinking about becoming a pornographer.
I'm thinking about sitting behind a camera.
I'm thinking about being an unseen voice.
I'm thinking about nobody seeing any part of me
except my **** while it's being ******.

I'm thinking gingers with tight *****.
I'm thinking emo girls with *******.
I'm thinking of beauty being manipulated.
I'm thinking tall, slender, bearded men with long hair pounding the **** out of the biggest ****** in town.

***** attract me.
It just depends on my behavior.
I have a ****.
A nice one.
With ***** that make it look tiny.

I love ******
I love ******
I love ******.
I love ******.

The creation of a ginger man who's name is ginger fred  
Such a ***** ******* when he had tarts in his bed
Those tarts where all so fruity they made his chocolate lead
His icing went all runny as they ****** his ginger bread

He would pop the cherry's and the strawberries he would ****
The blackcurrants we're okay they're still quite good to ****
He'd watch two lemons licking and pay them each a buck
Having all those tasty tarts he could not believe his luck

If he ends up in a jam you know what he's been licking
All those ******* jam filled tarts is the place his gingers sticking
So if you see a ginger man with all his buttons missing
You can bet your bottom dollar it's tarts that he's been kissing

One **** is just not enough his antics he'd be tripping
He would have a complete box even if it was crippling
With his ginger crumbling and his melting chocolate rippling
Some jam tarts are exceedingly good so **** you Mr Kipling