Modern, female poetry about adulthood and the masks we wear
I have been knocked over this week
Like pins at a bowling alley
Kicked and thrashed
Battered against the back
Of that mysterious black bit
You can’t see behind
Throttled by failure
Plagued by faux pas
And today I am supposed to dust
Myself off and present the shiniest
Brushed aluminium version of myself
To a total stranger
Desperately seeking an escape route
A respite for this mangled brain.
Work is swallowing me whole
I’m devoured, kicking and stomping against the roof of its Victorian mouth
Stringy thoughts like syrup
Cling to colleagues and projects and deadlines
And weekends are hazy and jagged
Flooded with feelings of money earning, the grind 48 hours from now
An empty Saturday lends itself to too much time spent musing
With money churning in the background
Realising you’re a cog, small and insignificant
Working always, whether it’s at the 9 to 5
Or working on myself
Always ruminating, stalling, forgetting, planning
Sheets sodden with schedules and words
Blunt days off with no real purpose
Work thoughts pour in like post drought rain.
There’s something to be said
For sitting on rattan chairs and looking up
At a tie dyed sky
The same inky blue I saw in a dress earlier
The one I added to basket but never checked out
This is a sky of another era, a time
When we rode like ghosts on American highways
Legs pressed up against the dashboard
Podcast blaring nonsense
Gently slipping into sleep
Half expecting to hit a deer
That fear every time we rounded a bend
Or you vroomed a little too callously
A cacophony of screeching, and my brain doing somersaults
Playing out the poor deer’s death
And this balmy air also smacks of times in Spain
By the sea where we built our lives
And had a fridge full of food
And money in the bank
Dusted pink sunsets trickling down to the seafront
Paellas baked fresh, inches from the seabed
Tummies content and hankering for margaritas on Friday nights
Warm all the time
Flip flops flung over shoulders
Walks down to the beach and then back to Lidl
For a feast
Work was still a drag, head filled with dread
Every fucking Sunday night
Like some stupidly mundane weekly ritual
The brain bashing, self inflicted fear and loathing in Las Palmas
I was still afflicted like I am now
But those balmy sun dappled evenings
Grinning on terraces
Stuck like insects in a treacly loveless web
Boy was it good sometimes.
you got your foot in the door
yet again, a beautiful ghost at it
once more
starve you, I tried
there’s whispers you care and you
want to make things right
but I throttle those whispers
they slip lifelessly into unconsciousness
I’m lighting my tongue on fire
just talking to you
but it’s not the same adoration
lingering like perfume
in the air
not the
drop-everything-lets-text-back
frenzy that once furrowed by brow
made me mad with “love”
drunk on lust
in fact
I couldn’t give a fuck.
boredom creeps
and the tinted, dirt speckled screen
is no company
when up against
the blood orange gaze of the sun –
burn covering my chest
from yesterday’s bake off.
there’s no escape from boredom
when you’re not procrastinating
because there’s nowt to do
in the first place
but the level of pressure
squashing that nowt
is not nowt at all –
it’s a monstrous fun sponge
sucking life and love from limb
rendering days dry
and desolate
mouths open
but nothing to say
fingers shoved into gussets
in search of redemption.
lemon groves and Spanish marble
sultry Split and Big Apples
so rosy your mouth waters
are so far away
you can’t taste the freedom anymore
and pearl-stained beaches
are no longer on the horizon.
Why don’t you loosen the reins
A gentle tug to prompt
Purpley, sunburnt
Sooty shackles to the ground.
Why don’t you lower the bar
Before it slices your head clean off
Making you wander
Like some mad headless chicken.
Why don’t you point the gun down
So your temples can stop
Throbbing
And your glands
Can start acting up.
Why don’t you let your smile fade
Take it off like boots after a hard
Day’s grind
Slip sweaty socks off
And leave them on the landing
Feel your gums breath again
Feel your teeth
Whisper thank you.
social media is awash with colour and rage
opening the app releases a tangle of feisty, hashtag-stuffed webs
everybody’s mouths are wide like venus fly traps
everybody’s tongues are wagging more than usual
everybody’s Stories spewing #BLM
celebs compelled to stick their oars into this sticky
systemic umbilical cord too
but coming off as disinterested, forced.
people are preaching and protesting and praying
spray painting their social media palettes
with the colours of death and deceit
hot on the heels of murder.
i’m cocooning, unsure how to proceed
followers vomiting up advice and financial gestures
go to this site, donate to this organisation
sign this petition, educate these people
money feels like a luxury, but slippery to pin down
and dock into the right place, like a slimy space station.
hate is running amok in society
omnipotence handed out like inappropriate candy
necks squashed like bugs
guns loaded too hastily
fists misguided, slamming into jaws
let’s meet those who’ve ventured down dirty paths
of death and decay
with rehabilitation
and the full weight of the law.
Oh coffee cup
Symbol of wealth, fragility,
Can’t get my kicks, can’t start my work,
Until I’ve sipped you, slurped you, talked dirty to you
Oh wonderful crutch
In my palm oh so much
Once a day when the dawn is yawning
And the desks are filling
I’ll dodge the queues
Trek upstairs to abuse
That frothy little mouth of yours.
You’re a white girl’s wet dream
A bolt of electricity
That mini panic attack shooting through me
As idle hands make their way around the city
They stumble onto you
And wrap around like an octopus
A rite of passage for the working youth
That I’ll fill with sugar to claim that boost
Because I can’t stand the taste
Of this drink that has such a place
Such a presence
In society today.
And she sat up there
Words like rose petals floating from mouth to floor
And I’m just perched here in awe
Having travelled an hour and a half door to door
To listen to words that are honey-like
Dripping into the mic
Sweet and inspiring
Forehead perspiring (don’t all of ours)
And I’m fearful for tomorrow
For the fruits it’ll bring
A dark shadow sewn into my skin
Brain etched in a fog
Burnt out by the London smog.
After the gig I paced up and down Tottenham court road
Like a wildly indecisive runner
With too much time on her hands
And a stomach full of Dr Pepper
Couldn’t bring myself to go back in
And bare my soul to someone new
Whose job isn’t to listen to me natter
Burst my thoughts forth in glorious splatter
So I trudged to the tube and hissed at tourists who wouldn’t move
As quickly as my marathon legs
Short and strong
I made the hour journey back home
Walking up a dimlit alley I’m fearful of tomorrow
And I’m laced with sorrow
It permeates my core
And leaves me sore
But strong all the same
For ever more.
As we rolled past the river
The monuments
The gold-clad beasts
Shaking, bathing in the glow
Of the water’s edge by Waterloo
Your duvet lips spring to mind
Permeate the creases of my brain
Invade my thoughts with a pick axe
Cutting down the others
I’d been growing
Like sweet nectar.
I melt beneath them
Chew on their plumpness
Get high on their juices
Those rolls that seal me
Like an envelope
Your loveliness cuts through
And bubbles beneath the surface
As the train tracks roll by.
I think of you when the night curses
And the day yawns open
And when my phone buzzes
And my body yearns to be touched.
Talking to my pillow. 