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Natalie Clark Apr 2013
We go together like
Digestives dipped in tea.
Your girlfriend and a hike.
A sting and a bee.

I love you like
Dogs love chasing postmen.
Halfords love a bike.
Teachers love red pen.

I need you like
Meerkats need you to go to a different website.
Aunt Josephine needed Ike.
Ghosts need to fright.

In summary, then,
We go together like
I love you like
I need you like

Really poor metaphors.
A reference to popular culture.
An ironic rhyme scheme and rhythm that vanishes towards the end.
Don’t you love a flirt, darling?
Phoebe May 2014
Hey you,
I didn't want anything special,
Just a night cuddled up,
On the sofa,
Big cups of tea and digestives
(Shotgun the chocolate ones),
No programme in particular,
Just talking together
Like we used to.
mybarefootdrive Mar 2016
I know you are older than me,
there are substantial years between us.
I see a woman who tries hard to be strong
to combat the daily **** she encounters.

I know you think you hide it and to others you surely do,
well, in fact.
It is plain to see you do a good job.
But I am not them.
I see.
I know.

Behind your soulful brown eyes
I know you are the woman who has lived twice.
Like many warriors on planet earth you were not given a choice.
You did not have the luxury from birth to live a life that was solely yours.

You carried the weight.
You shed tears like the skin you shed,
when one day you stopped and told yourself,
you deserved more,
you deserved more than pain
and putting others first.

Like many women you reached an age where your maternal need became too great to ignore.
As a girl your dreams carried you to motherhood
but that's all they could ever be; fantasy, imaginary games.
Reality would deal you your set of cards.
Devastatingly; there would be no fetus in the womb.

You would routinely feel dull aches upon glancing at mothers,
returning to their husbands.
Doing the school run,
grocery shopping.
Rising to acute levels of pain.
The type you struggle to brush off.
When you know something's really wrong.

That very same suburbia you rolled your eyes at,
convincing yourself you didn't want it.
Became all you ever wanted.
Always just slightly out of reach.

You would build a home with what little resources you had.
In turn, that home would be the prettiest in the neighborhood.
Delicate twining vines of sweet honeysuckle
Sun flowers standing tall and proud
to match your sunny disposition.
Anyone who ever passed could have sworn they were wearing a beaming smile.

I would call round to repaint your white picket fence,
in return for a handful of digestives and your company.
Harboring a deep heartfelt respect I would try to channel through my eyes.
I would tell you I am here.
And I can be more.
If you need me.

And how I would love to make you laugh,
really laugh,
throw back your head.
I know there is a lightness to your depth.
You have had to be so strong for so long.
It is not too late to be whisked off your feet.
Mateuš Conrad Apr 2022
title: scandal tilt
body: porous: per & marie 2019:
simultaneously: preserved...

wow!

on my way back from a shift at Craven Cottage... walked through the park with great haste, sweat like a pig prior to slaughter when sitting down on the District Line from Putney Bridge to Victoria... still wearing my jacket... upon disembarking the train, took the jacket off... breathed... allowed my sweaty back to breathe, took off my clip-on tie, undid about three button from the collar down... well... i've been told before that i'm as hairy as a monkey... hairy face, hairy chest, hairy stomach... a Turkish ******* would never mind... we only travelled two stops from Victoria through to Oxford Circus... i have to write the following word in katakana... what... a *******... スカ - SUKA... *****... a female-dog... what's the ideogram of that katakana? no... it's not that simple... SUKA... thank god i was wearing my sunglasses... the Thames bore these two holes for my eyes with the glimmer of the sun being reflected come sunset... i asked my co-worker: Putney Bridge is not the last bridge of... the first bridge of London? he mentioned: isn't there one at Hammersmith? isn't there one at Richmond: i replied? favourite bridge? oh... you that film: from the 1990s... Sliding Doors... the Battersea Bridge? no no... not the Battersea Bridge... that white one, with all those Christmas Lights... it's the Albert Bridge... sure... we know the last Bridge of London is the Tower Bridge... but what bridges are there after Putney?! oh... we're not going into Oxfordshire or... Kingston-upon-Thames... **** that... London, proper... **** me... the map on google reads like some Arabic text: right to left... weird... what comes after Putney... see... when i was living in Edinburgh... at least i knew my bearings... there it was... the shining emblem of the compass... the Firth of Forth... down in London? it's a ******* Bermuda triangle! the ****** just spins and spins... people come from all other i'm like: yeah... "that"... that's not supposed to be there but... "there"...  clueless... sure as ****... after Putney Bridge you get the Hammersmith Bridge... then the Chiswick Bridge... then the Kew Bridge... then the Twickenham Bridge... that's the last proper bridge on the map... London will forever be too disorientating... at least Edinburgh is facing north... London isn't facing any direction on the compass... it just... spins out of control... so i got on the Victoria line at Victoria... two *******... one looking somewhat tame... the other... ooh... what a treat... we were only going as far as Oxford Circus... red hair... some of her's some fake... tattoos on her hands and fingers... she looked like she had piercing in her cheeks in the past... just my type: crazy... unhinged... daddy issues: whatever... and i''m standing there, tired... dead-beat... i just want to get home and drink some whiskey and scribble... about my triumph while helping a few boys sell cookies and brownies for charity by changing around their stall arrangement... because i wasn't put into the stadium to shove a lot of lard around... i'm peering through my sunglasses... oh... wait... she's digging me... oh right... she's one of those girls into the Scandinavian look? oh god, one of these ones... only hours prior i was talking to this Finnish grandfather about sports in general... i'm giving off these whiffs of Viking "beauty"... **** me: and i know what i'm goign to say next: that sort of physiognomy always attracts the happy-tattooed-hands and fingers red hair types of *******... right? where they **** is my ******* Mohawk then?! where the **** are my tattoos... i mean... i've seen dogs with eyes like these... eagerly brown and blooming with joy... any other scenario... we got off at Oxford Circus... i waited a little... she just about ****** off down the North Bakerloo route... i spotted her... obviously... she tried to give a shy glance back: would i follow her... ask her for her number... she had the most amazing: inquisitive eyes... i know... she wanted me to approach her... one of those... magical movie scenes... two strangers on the tube... blah blah... if work didn't **** me off... if i didn't have to make up for it on my own crowds from something within like: self-initiative... just my-******-up-type... no... i went down the Central Line route... travelled to Stratford... got the train to Goodmayes... bought a bottle of 200cl of brandy... some pepsi... some cigarettes... and walked past Chadwell Heath... thinking... about absolutely nothing... well... the "one that god away"... sure... it's not even whether i have the patience... i obviously have the charm... but i know how the conversation would have started and ended... so... you still don't live alone? you don't have a place for me to crash... bring all my belongings to? guess... what... what she said with her eyes... perfect! what she would later say with her tongue? no, i don't want to hear it... beccause i'd be her stereotypical loser... so... why... ******* bother? with those eyes of hers i also received: twice-more with the eyes of the boys i helped to collect more money from selling charity cookies in the park... oh **** me: more! because it was selfless! there was no ******-friction involved!  sure, i could try to rekindle my self (in the reflective, not the reflexive: myself... sense... no... that's long gone... i've aged, i've learned some pretty good lessons of reserve) with a teenage boy i used to be, who would fall asleep listening to Roxette... fading like a flower, watercolours in the rain, blah blah... but this... what's that film? Happiness of a Spotless Mind? Jim Carrey... crazy free spirited girl with red or purple or blue hair... sure... and if, myself, didn't go mad aged 21... entering a church... hearing a choir and then hear a great wind disperse the singing... sure... right now... aged 35... i'd be a proper career-boy... not caring about the lesser people in me... status-orientated... i would easily pick-up these wacko girls left right and centre... and give them a month's worth of... living out the Pretty Woman fantasy... no.. instead i have a personal library in my ivory tower of a bedroom in my parent's house filled with Heidegger's black notebooks... oh man... but this one... she had prettier eyes than an Alsatian's... she gave off whiffs of surprise... could she love me, like i am? torn? perhaps... i forgot to make a reality-check-cheque in my head... better this fleeting interaction... she... infatuated: me indifferent... at least in the moment... obviously now i think about it... sure... some, "alternative" universe... where... we might live an affordable living in... the ******* Shetland Islands caretaking a lighthouse! but my life hasn't been all that predictable to find more unpredictability all of a sudden... some exercise in a vitality for / of life... i just need little pockets of being acknowledged by the other as being recipient of existence... that usually comes along with children and handicapped people... or animals... these three categories always spot me... if i were ******* rising in the hierarchy of the truly insane-sane folk... i'd have to be as mad as a poodle-or-a-toddler's-worth-of-Mozart! ****'s sake... no no no... i'm not buying that trip! **** that... i'm going my own way... to a place where the moon is a skull in the coldness of the night, and come April... there is a whiff of a Magnolia scent in the air! i call it trans-temporal pairing to some cue to a clue to this puzzle... but this one... my god... eyes like a properly bred Alsatian... so endearingly brown... she looked like a teenage girl for a second's worth of flash of time... she just looked so ****** up... like a puzzle box... and with all that make-up she slapped up... Madam Tussauds' replicas saw less... what's the retrospect? i? i'm scared of reality? last time i heard: i've been the one most detached from it... why would i be afraid of reattaching myself to it? the only reality i find comforting is... when i'm surrounded by children, retards or animals... i consider plants as inanimate objects, so no... other thoughts... mother's arthritis... a father coming to the conclusion of this career... nearing retirement... their mortality... my mortality... cinema movie love stories are sort of gone... reality doubles-down... no one was truly with me when i needed help... ergo? i helped myself the best i could... and... i don't need loved-up pretend hitch-hickers... how authentic it might seem... at least when i visit a brothel... no ******* is going to say: oh... another loser... how are losers treated in those Japanese love-hotels because of over-crowding, no-house-building "claustrophobia"?

on my way back from a shift at Craven Cottage...
tired... left the house at quarter to 9am...
came back.. at 8:30pm...
and did what? only a 6 hour shift... got paid...
hmm... good idea... i don't even know...
capitalism... whoever defends it ought to know
that there are rogue companies out there...
the current company i'm working for...
i'm supposedly an employee...
   but... they have... since November of last year...
yet to issue me with a statement to clarify
how many hours i've worked and what i'm to be paid...
they just... transfer money into my bank account:
without any: black on white clarification...
i've already heard stories about the owner and co-owner...
how they profited from the pandemic...
little pawn me... a year... i just need a year...
to get those references... even today i started talking
to this guy about joining another company...
at least that company has an online rubric in place:
where you can book in electronically
rather than rely on some bogus whatsapp messaging...
******* cowboys... meat-heads... the whole lot
of them... no logistical sensibility...
but i've done it since November... i'll wait...
i'm patience... i'll play nice... but today...
oh today was coming... they're behaving like it's
a ******* schoolyard... i'm being punished for having
mentioned already having a university education:
oh god! and a degree in chemistry!
some are studying pretend-law... or whatever *******...
or they have known each other for a bit longer...
or that i'm not talkative: professional... while they
stab each other in the back... or...
i fancy this one girl who started work...
rumours spread that a supervisor is ******* her...
but i approach her with flowers on Valentine's day...
she gets fired... i get sidelined...
          oh i know my place... it's a place that's
called the waiting game...
         but today i was *******... less capable people
were put into positions within the stadium...
me? again: to the ******* park with you...
some might say: oh... he's ben given the easy shift...
yeah... the ****** shift...
   i made due counters... i had to...
by the end of the game a ginger colt that was
ejected during the game... drunk... had nothing better
to do than to sleep in the park... i tended to him...
woke him up... waited with him for his friends to rejoin
him... so half-asleep... i comforted him with:
you team (Coventry) beat Fulham 3 - 1... happy?
he replied... why do all the best games happen when
i'm asleep? well... this must have been the first
in a park in London... you're lucky it was a gorgeous day...
but my pinnacle came when i helped these boys
who were selling homemade bakes for charity...
NSPCC... £1 a pop... but they weren't selling them...
because they position their stall right behind a tree...
so i walked up to them... listen...
you're not going to sell them... you're hiding behind
a tree... here... let's move this stall of yours...
away from the tree... and closer to the route of leaving
fans... and let's also twist the table a little so...
your BAKED-GOODS for CHARITY is facing
the people walking out of the stadium...
    i finished my shift... would you know it...
             from about 30 unsold pieces of dough...
the boys had only 2 left...
           and how they thanked me...
   fine... FINE... if this steward contra SIA hierarchy
is in place... ******* wanks...
i'll do a better job elsewhere... pacifying people...
after all... all those with those SIA badges... licenses...
oh... they know **** all of judo...
they just rush overpower: art of ****...
   first comes the art of reason...
much much later comes any physical interference...
but i'm working with half-wits...
  just because some are bulging... have a voiced-prowess...
gorilla-mating-call-warfare i call it...
they think they have a license to: attend to doors
they build up this superiority-complex...
which is great... i might therefore ask:
not that i have a PhD... but... if you're going to belittle me...
do you have a degree in chemistry?
just today... i picked up a high-viz. orange...
later it was changed to black... i picked up one with
the word: supervisor on it... because it fitted me:
2XL... oh no no... one of the other pawns inquired...
you can't wear that... but it's black...
i was told to change from orange to black...
but this one has the word: SUPERVISOR written on
it... my god... how people have learned to overvalue
themselves... or rather: how have become become
undervalued that they have to have these little battles...
the war is already lost...
whatever ******* Einstein figured this one out...
so at the end of the shift we're about to stand down...
me and my "mate" are park 3... we're looking for park 2...
right... and we're all wearing black vests... black trousers...
black coats... the crowd that's leaving?
well... you know how the English dress...
hardly in the United Colours of Benetton...
or the old way that GAP used to attire people: colourfully...
so... i'm looking for a black moth
among a cloud of dark grey moths... great!
******* genius! like i said:
i'm working with ******* meat-heads...
i'd like to say retards but they are too bulky and too angry
and too ready to stance themselves as BIG
rather than arm themselves with cunning...
o.k. o.k. work... but i got the upper hand...
i helped those boys sell those cookies... cakes... whatever...
out of their stash... we just moved the table away
from the tree... shifted it so the sign was more apparent
and... hey presto! NSPCC got its fair share...
and... my reward? the sweetest thank you any man
can receive... the outstanding look on a young boys face
that a stranger is capable of helping (him)...
that's ******* priceless... i'm writing about all those
petty squabble prior... but... that thank you:
that look of longing for hope in the future...
that's mine... i own that... or that tenderness of
the drunk boy who was sleeping in the park
waiting for the game to finish... while i gentle touched
his leg to wake him up... that too...
i don't need physical confrontation when i can:
appease... comfort... all those adrenaline junkies...
those... amphetamine-anabolic-steroid: former prison
guard types... whatever...
i know one decent move that could floor anyone...
you make a cross with your thumbs... while pretending
to pray... with these hands... you grip someone
by the knuckles... pressing the thumbs into the hand...
and twist... i forgot martial art i learned that from...
i left the classes after i was kicked in the *****...
and curled into a foetal position: after i refused to:
shout HA-YA! when pretending to punch and throwing
kicks while marching forward...
****** lessons in martial arts... getting kicked in the *****...
but... i write this... like...
like i will never go to the gym and pump weights...
just give me 2 hours on a bicycle...
doing some press-ups...
and once the shift it gone... having being paired
with this "mate" of mine:
he'll reply: it was nice working with you...
and you sort of know it's almost...
when he tries to sell you an alternative
job to the current you're working at...
because... it's "CAPITALISM":
   i too heard... didn't you hear?
if you have the right sort of a microphone...
and you put it up to a dog's *******
when the dog's running...
you can... hear... ******* the tune of:
jingle-bells!
didn't you know?!
   esp. that version from Lethal Weapon...
      one ****, count one two...
two's a ****'s worth... three and four and by five:
grr... what's not to love about
life and all the arguments for the status quo
of all those people that always go ahead
and gear up the tide of: away away we go:
leaving the rest of the idiots behind...
           tear-jerking psychologists with an audience
of soft-cookie:
those types that ought to be hard-on
digestives... instead... they get dunked into tea...
i burp... what... a cushion my crap and crab
on the inside out...
rather than harden it with the exoskeleton
of the outside in...
            little ******* London adventure of... perhaps
Romance... but... most probably:
probably not.

i mean: you know how the joke goes?
when you diagnose someone as having lost touch
with reality?
and then... too many people have lost touch with reality?
the supposed loss of reality of the individual...
transpires like a phantom: clout...
why were people supposing that, "i" became detached
from reality?! huh?! why are these people
wearing pseudo-niqab nappies on their faces
when almost pretending to be: trainspotting?!
huh?!
           i'm schizophrenic... what about all these...
covert... hidden... undiagnosed hyperchondriacs?
i thought i was just a bilingual...
oh... right... the mono-lingual normies of England...
sure... "we" can follow-up with that...
"you" try to destroy "me"...
"we'll" come after "you":
gender neutral? one's a ROYAL:
one and we...
                anything to: bypass the ******* rap!
investment from years... years ago...
always invest in children...
you never know when they'll come around to
protect you against the elders
or... more importantly...
your contemporaries...
                always invest in children...
         their presence is a future forward:
kinder:
      immer invertieren im kinder...
   ihr(e) gegenwart ist ein zukunft: ein fließen!
i'm guessing...
unlike in Deutsche...
a(n) apple... savvy?

           i truly wish... i truly... want to believe
beyond the told ties of the heart to:
all the discomforts of reality checks...
that i could possibly come to the splendours of
illusion on a whim:
and keep such whims within the confines
of illusion... without having to have to reality
check them back with...
items of "reciprocated" gratitude...
for the "good life"... oh what a sweet little whisper...
and... if i were a painter...
what a Francis Bacon horror i would possibly
conjure with the aid of cubism...
such trivial times are beyond us...
dog have eyes and the levelled certainty as such...
women just have the spontaneity...
there's no Bonaparte behind them...
no suicide quest for Moscow... no... chains and harship...
believe whatever psychologists you want...
pop, piquant... whatever... piquant: i.e. niche...
whatever... no one helped me through my 20s...
now in my mid 30s...
i've finally reached a pinnacle of being attractive...
during transit... but i know it's all a veneer...
behind my visage there ought to be some
******* miraculous story where...
i'd probably invite her back to my flat...
where i live alone... blah blah...
                i own too many books...
   i prefer the safety net of prostitutes...
at least they love me for the way i **** them...
with the intensity of the moment...
i posit: carpe diem... and make an hour last
a certainty... i don't need this *******'s worth
of timid courtship... no thank you...
i waited long enough... i waited too long...
no more...
              i'm done... i'm going to brush my "Greek" nose
up a little more... with arrogance and say...
when i needed you? you weren't there...
now... that you might, perhaps want me?
no... i don't need you...
           you know what i really need?
strangers! i need to interact with as many people
as possible! i can't be bothered with living a life
for some... exclusive relationship!
i need... the most inclusive: selfless relationship!
a... motto akin to:
liebe für das volk!
               if not in Deutsche... then in Latin?

AMOR ENIM POPULUS!

who else? who else can one love?
if one has been denied the excusive rights to love a woman
in one's youth?
as one ages... being denied such a right?
one can only grow to abound in loving:
the people! how else is one to survive?
   what? the same old: "missing"... "mythological":
"exclusive": female?
learn from Adolf ******! LIEBE DAS VOLK!
                  you haven't been given exclusive rights
to counterpart individual...
and... to be honest... inclusivity is stressed by both
status of wife / bus-driver in terms of how
universality is to be expressed on the ground:
all are to be treated equally...
alles ar zu sein behandelt gleichermaßen,
id est: gott! mit! uns!

             i have no one to love... i truly do, not,
so why... keep myself deluded in some...
waiting game of exclusivity?!
   why not freely pass into a medium of selfless
inclusivity?! why... not love: as freely...
and as painfully... as a sparrow might...
the dawn of spring... and the midnight or some:
forgotten hour(s): to come...
    i'm too old to find exclusive love...
to pair-bond... i'm too old... i know the frosty bite
of reality... but at least i can love inclusively...
like a Jesus Christ... like an Adolf ******...
what?! they're... that ******* far apart?! i don't...
*******... ****-ing... think so...
       i'm more comfortable with inclusive love-affairs
where i can be forever pillar... cold...
less-spoken that could be expected...
    my 20s... i never had them...
                    my 30s just about returned...
and now i'm interacting with people in their 40s
and 50s... and all i have in my mind is...
a cat... in musketeer type of boots...
kicking a rat into a sewer... why?
because... that's seems... just about... GERECHT!
Steve Page Mar 11
Our biscuits were in tupperware
Sealed tight but not tight enough
Digestives and custard creams
Slowly got stale and soft.

Our biscuits were in tupperware
Bought in bulk, a cheap job lot
Garibaldis and dry rich teas
Tea-dunked to hit the spot.

Our biscuits were in tupperware
Mum was a tupperware lady
Biscuits, cakes and crackers
Stored to last til pay day.
Happy childhood

— The End —