Uncategorized – Page 2 – Talking to my pillow.

Like mother like daughter

May 6, 2018 pillow talker2 Comments

I’ve started donning flowery knee-length dresses,

Reminiscent of Squires garden centres and Japanese cherry blossom,

And I realise I’m turning into my mum.

She likes floaty, bell-shaped gowns with kaleidoscopic floral patterns,

The likes of which can be found in Monsoon, Oasis or Next,

Where the flowers are on steroids.

Be it tops, shirts, hats or skirts,

Madge laps them up, arms clad with fabric tulips

And strawberry-coloured petals as she waits at the checkout.

Like mother like daughter, I’ve been sucked in to these flowers,

Like a bee to honey.

In a similar vein, I get excited when buying new sponges

Fancy crockery and rainbow-coloured place mats.

Cleaning day has turned from “I don’t want to do this” to “I fucking love mopping”

And that’s how I know I’m her Mini Me.

With a splash of Dettol on that magic wand, she’ll leave cookers glistening

And floors so clean you could eat your dinner off them.

Wafts of lavender emanating from bed-sheets

And bathtubs free of pubes.

I used to stomp my feet and abhor said tasks,

But now I relish in a tidy kitchen, sweet-smelling bathroom

And smudge-less mirror.

Give me a fresh sponge and my night will be made,

Let me mop ’til the water is muddy and I’ll be satisfied.

For years I mocked mum’s love of cleaning,

Snorted at her anal ways and willingness to iron socks and knickers

‘Til the cows came home.

I guess I’d best start flinging disparaging remarks at myself,

Because I am her. And there’s no one else I’d rather be like.

The sun and old people and the madness of fashionable burning.

May 1, 2018 pillow talker2 Comments

What is it with old people when they come on holiday.

Mister, to achieve the shade of “pink” you’ve bravely opted for,

You might as well have stuck your head inside an oven

And roasted like a turkey.

Put some sprouts around your mouth

Stick some ‘tatoes round your buttocks,

And a pretty pink gobbler you’d make.

Mrs Saggy Bottom, do you not KNOW the danger of too much sun exposure?

A dollop of cream might banish that neon red line

Around your neck.

And to you Sir, the one I spy

Sizzling away on a sun lounger slumbering,

Haven’t you a bed that could provide more comfort,

Or do you delight in dyeing your back a deep shade of lobster red?

Sore in the morning, blistered to touch,

And yet you’ll get up and do it all over again the next day

No wonder you look like an old leather boot.

When I am home

Apr 27, 2018May 6, 2018 pillow talkerLeave a comment

I am looking forward to the smoky back-garden haze,

And fog drifting over the horizon in winter.

Home is where I used to hang out of my window on the bluest of moon nights

And shuffle with Chuck Berry and Johnny Cash.

Winter is always the ripest, best, most elegant time of year

Because the ferns all sing sweetly in the breeze

And the rustle of a middle-class life echoes through the town.

Mornings are clad in grey clouds, making Gilmore Girls re-runs oh so inviting,

Sunlight peaks through, emerging from the sky’s womb,

At around 2 o’clock.

This is home to me. I’ve been away for 3 years

And now I’m desperate to find that shelter again.

Hello, eternal lover.

Apr 15, 2018Apr 15, 2018 pillow talkerLeave a comment

He pushes his hair out of his eyes and grins. I’ve got Ketchup smeared over my chin.

A noodle ran amok and painted a pretty picture on my face.

Lunch is the best time of the day, I’m like a lioness ready to pounce.

A juicy gazelle smothered in sauce, a side of nachos, dripping with honey-laced pulled pork,

Sits before me. I feel my mouth water.

I’ve come to the conclusion, and am willing to accept,

That I am (how shall I put it?) engaging in a steamy love affair,

With food.

Feed me and you’ll have me in your pocket.

Polly pocket pig rocket,

Exploding and oinking in oodles of pleasure and zesty grunts. Roll me in sour cream and let’s have ourselves a party.

Lunch and dinner may be the highlights of my day (is that sad?)…

Saucy noodles can use my face as a canvas for all I care,

And sticky doughnut sugar can brush against my lips and tease my tongue.

Cheese can slide down my throat, fatty and unforgiving,

Choke my arteries. (If I can’t see it then it mustn’t be true, right?)

I’ll dump shrimp carcasses, burger lettuce and pizza crusts in the bin,

But food will never dump me.

The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plain.

Jan 31, 2018Jan 31, 2018 pillow talkerLeave a comment

Today on Gran Canaria, it rained something fierce.

Blouses and trousers shook on the clothes lines and were left sodden, stretched and hanging.

I prayed for them not to break loose and fly away. Knickers would be strewn across the pavement, bras caught on flag poles next to a sea of red and yellow and socks crouching in dirt-ridden gutters. Thankfully the pegs stood strong.

Children came to school with giant overcoats and umbrellas, ready for an indoor break time and the rescheduling of after-school stuff. They said their match was cancelled, so why wasn’t English?

I couldn’t really explain why.

The Irish Goodbye.

Jan 13, 2018 pillow talkerLeave a comment

On the day of my departure, I spotted a corner in her bedroom and thought about what might happen if I stayed there. Lurking, hiding, tugging at the duvet with nimble fingertips… the corner looked so comfortable, so peaceful. Shrouded beneath micro-fibres and cat hairs which always flutter up my nose and make my chest wheeze, I could stay there and not have to go back. The life of an expat isn’t always so rosy when you’re headed for a country you wish you hadn’t ventured to in the first place. And as you feel your body being shoved hard in one direction, you start to dig your heels into the ground and that corner, that tiny, honeycomb crevice of carpet and dead skin suddenly looks so appealing… The same thing happened at Disneyland. I was on my year abroad and hating every second. A moment’s joy came in the form of a weekend break to Disneyland Paris and I found myself staring at another corner (this time in a bathroom) and wondering what would happen if I just stayed there, curled up like a kitten… and never went back to my desk job. Strange, isn’t it? How corners and small spaces seem to offer comfort in dark times, beckoning me in with open arms and clutching me to their simple bosom. Safe spaces are lovely and inviting, but in a similar vein to comfort zones, nothing grows inside them.

Sixteen.

Nov 28, 2017 pillow talkerLeave a comment

I’m trying to remember what I was like at sixteen.
Hair flat, nails worn, a thick shell weighing heavily down on my back,
I fell in love with a rockstar with thick, tousled locks and tight, leather pants.
He was better than any boy I’d gazed at, any boy whom I’d written to on MSN.
That callous green icon flickering.

My students aren’t like sixteen year olds.
Immaculately groomed, nails chiselled, no shell displayed on their backs,
I shudder when I’m with them, hunch when I’m explaining,
Confused gazes litter the air,
And smirks and faces smacking of apathy.

But they are sixteen, that ripe old age,
When Sixteen Candles and Pretty In Pink should be a staple.
And me?
I withered like a flower in front of adults,
I retreated back into my shell in class,
(Don’t. Make. Me. Read)
I self-flagellated any chance I got,
And still do.

Where is my confidence? Am I lacking some crucial brain component?
I’ll soon be turning a quarter of a century.
So why do these sixteen year olds intimidate me?

Hotel buffet blues

Oct 22, 2017Oct 22, 2017 pillow talker1 Comment

At the start of every day

I say

I’m going to be a vegetarian.

But then one sweaty Sunday

A hotel buffet calls,

Rows of striped bacon, fluffy eggs

And spongey sausages which flutter

Down my gullet…

I saunter up for a third helping

Delights piled high on the plate,

A leaning tower of meaty Pisa.

Let’s stuff ourselves to the brim

More so now than we’ve ever done

Because it’s free of course,

Gotta get that dollar’s worth

Even though the bacon fat

Will choke our hearts.

Thirteen glasses of orange juice

And a bucket of coffee later

I’m nauseatingly full.

With a ketchup-stained mouth

And greasy fingers

I swear not to do it again

Hotel buffets are a blessing and a curse

For those with never-ending stomachs.

Stuff.

Oct 19, 2017Oct 19, 2017 pillow talkerLeave a comment

With oodles of stuff greasing our palms

The charcoal children across the pond look on enviously.

Candle holders, glitter bralets, pasty camera lenses

Stuff pours from the crevices of the West.

I sit at my computer, bug-eyed in front of Primark hauls

Poundland hauls, bikini hauls

This is what I bought, this is how it looks

But all this stuff is made by dirt-ridden, miniature fingers

In dingy factories, sordid and dim-lit.

Half the world is overflowing with stuff

While the other half is dying.

And yet I’ll continue to sit here watching people unwrap packages, boxes, food parcels and useless objects ’til the cows come home. Purchases which make no sense, purchases which are unnecessary and make me wonder why we yearn for SO. MUCH. STUFF. Is it just our generation? Are we just a product of capitalism? The puppets in its sour show? Online shopping makes us green with envy and purple with desire. Wallets wide open, money flaunted and egos stroked. Yet, across the pond there are people dying of starvation, crippled by wars and dictatorships. These are people who struggle to find clean water and a decent meal, who would give anything to be fighting the crowds in Primark instead of fighting to survive, ducking from bombs, dodging injustice, and squirming at the corruption which lies so blatantly within their lands. These are the same people who are responsible for crafting the products we pay through the nose for, and yet barely a penny reaches them. We show the world what we’ve bought and how much we’ve paid, failing to acknowledge how we came to acquire it and who was instructed to make it. It’s disgusting and mind-numbing when you finally realise how messed up everything is.