Bread

The pigeons on St Paul's were at it again.

Fighting.

Six of them over one piece of bread.

Pecking and flapping.

No bigger than an inch square.

And one of them curiously chasing another one round in circles.

Imagine if they saw all the bread in the flat.

Mountains of it.

We can barely open the front door.

Art

Birmingham Art Gallery.

We went straight for the best bit.

Past all the punters

and the Ozzy Osbourne bollocks.

We laughed at them.

We went straight for the best bit.

Right in the back.

Through huge marble doorways and stained glass doors.

There he was.

At long last.

Henri Matisse.

Memories

The times I think about the most

Aren't the times I thought I'd think about the most.

Good or bad.

I don't remember yelling and fighting and tears.

Nor elation.

It tends to be the quieter moments

I think of the most.

Staggering home

Full of cheer.

The near-misses and the lost chances.

This could be one now.

A moment.

But don't worry,

There'll be another one along soon.

Edinburgh

Christmas day in Edinburgh.

Mulled wine at the gate.

I still remember them laughing

With their hands over their face so I wouldn't see.

Berlin?

In Berlin I met a cat

On the way home from the club.

Out of my tree.

Could have been a dog.

Could have been Amsterdam

Now that you mention it.

I think it was a gay bar in Amsterdam.

But I walked home happy and sad.

Thirsty

No free water on the plane.

I've never been thirstier in my life.

The oasis in the desert costs €4.

No chance.

Sat between a cactus and a scarab beetle,

Who keeps taking the arm rest.

I could murder an Evian.

Probably cheaper to drink the Joop.

Black country car

Says there's a bomb in his car.

Banana in his exhaust pipe.

And the front wipers don't work.

DAB? You'm jokin ay ya?

0-60 any day now.

Up to 80 if it's over a cliff.

It ay up to much.

Snowmen

I count no less than SIX(!) snowmen on St Paul's.

Stood about in circles,

Hanging around.

Just chatting, you know.

They didn't seem to mind

About the weather.

One of them nods at me to the others.

Pointing me out.

Not a friendly sort of nod.

The kind of nod where it's clear I was looking too long.

Then the others look.

Then started drifting over.

I pretend to be looking at the church behind them and walk home quickly.

Fashion

Take a big shirt. Like real big.

Cut off the sleeves

Just to outside the shoulders.

Tuck loosely into trousers, turned up.

Or shorts - as short as possible

And then I am myself.

Poor Bryce

Chambray shirt with a suit jacket?

That's your second mistake, Bryce.

Strike two, Bryce.

You know what happens at strike three, don't you Bryce?

Bryce's lip quivered.

Just a little something from me

I bought you these

Because you said you're going away.

They're just books…

But you know, “All human life is here”.

This one's good. Funny.

This one's kind of sad.

This one's a bit of an undertaking.

But I guess you'll have more time on your hands.

This one I haven't read yet.

I thought we could try it together.

Anyway, I love them. And I love you.

So read these and think of me,

And I will think of you.

Sadlympics

We were talking about who had the most trauma.

So we started a competition.

The sadlympics.

The judges had a job.

Is it worst to have no dad, or a bad dad?

The podium didn’t feel very celebratory.

But the closing ceremony was excellent.

Neighbours

I saw a neighbour getting food from the Deliveroo man.

“I’ve just had coke and ice cream delivered it’s so awful.”

“At least,” I said “if we're rained off for the weekend you’ll have the essentials."

I bumped into another neighbour outside my corridor, I take it I startled her in opening my door, as she said as much.

I apologised, naturally, but wondered how it could be so. I wouldn’t say I carried my 100kg in a terribly cat-like manor

Plates

"Do you want one plate or two?"

I asked from the kitchen.

We were sharing a starter.

I’m damned either way really.

If I get two plates you’ll be saying:

“Could’ve done with one, saved the washing up.”

And if I put em on one I’ll get it the other way:

“Now we’re fighting over the one plate.”

Might as well not bother.

Stranger Dinner

I turned up at a stranger dinner

Two people cancelled

So there we were

Me, a large tentacle monster, the Dowager Hestletine and a ghost

I asked the ghost to pass the salt. He just gave me a vacant look

"I'll get it" said the tentacle monster

"A bit of me is over there anyway"

Act Accordingly

He/him/she/her

Well how do you know?

What stress have you placed on your own gender identity?

What questions have you asked of yourself?

Have you tried the alternative?

Your gender is a performance.

Perform it!

PAINT your nails,

SHADOW your eyes,

and MAKE UP your face.

Show some belly, some leg hair and a moustache.

Shave your pubes into magnificent topiary.

Be kind, most radically to others and to yourself.

Venture into queer spaces and be curious. But remember.

You are a guest here. Act accordingly.

Water

I think I’m drinking too much water.

Four litres a day, that's alright isn't it?

At the end of the day my eyes bubble up like olives in a martini.

So that seems like a red flag.

Cobblestone

There’s a patch of new tarmac in the cobbled streets of north Birmingham.

There used to be an old stone there, among all the others.

But somebody took it.

I took it.

It’s in my flat right now.

Speech

He thanked his new mother in law again.

This was the eighth around with the thank yous, he couldn’t seem to stop.

The speech was already too long, and now he’d done it eight times.

Better go again from the top.

The second time people thought it was nerves,

The third time seemed like a joke,

They stoped cheering at the fifth time around,

And by six people started to join in,

Chanting along.

“I’d like to raise a toast.”

Prison

It was the quarterly day out for the local prison.

The service station was full of black and white jumpsuits.

Little arrows all over the place.

Slasher and Basher wanted a subway.

Stabby Johnson got Burger King instead,

But he said it took too long,

And the fries weren’t the same as they used to be.

Grandma

“But why are you going to Spain for the surgery?”

She hit the word ‘Spain’ with some venom, as if Foreign Surgery was insufficient. Not to be trusted.

It would not be reliable or stiff in the upper-lip department. Not like British Surgery.

The surgery could be trusted neither to keep calm nor to carry on.

Car-n't do this anymore

“Just what’s it all for Sandra, know what I mean?”

She was at first confused as to why the car had driven itself to the edge of a wide lake, and now seemed to be looking wistfully looking across the water.

Cars can’t be wistful can they? No.

She knew that.

The car couldn’t be wistful, and it definitely didn’t just let out a sigh.

“Wake up everyday. Drive here. Drive there. But what’s the point?”

There was a ‘click’ as the doors locked.

Three Poems

“You should be careful,” I said,

There was a woman at the gym skipping with what looked like steel wire.

She was moments away from losing an eye. Or a foot.

“I think one of the Ninja Turtles had something like that.”

She had big headphones on and couldn’t hear me.

We were in the park, looking for conkers.

Avery was looking to challenge the 2002 Woodlands Primary School conker champion.

He picked up a green spiky ball from the floor and handed it to me.

“Oh, well done.” I said.

“That’s a Sycamore seed.” He said.

“Oh, that’s rubbish then.”

And I threw it away.

The other team handed us their answer sheet.

They were doing quite poorly in comparison, but there were only two of them. We had five.

Simon wanted to give them an answer for an extra point.

I said no. Drunk with power.

I wanted to keep all the points for myself.

Lipbalm

There’s a lip balm in our car

That was there long before I’ve been

But it still gets used these many months since

It’s clotted, but I’m told it’s clean.

And why would you get a new one?

This one works just fine

There are many lip balms like it

But this one is mine