APPLE

I noticed the girl

serving at the sushi
come fast food place
almost straight away.

She ran around the place

Up and down the stairs.

Only later, I thought to tell her

That you can run around your whole life
But they will still put you in a box next to someone
Who has done nothing his whole life.

She had tight trousers on

And I could not take my eyes off her ass.

Every time she ran past me

as I sat and eat my noodles
I looked at that ass.
It was firm
Like a ripe green apple
Cut in half
And covered with a cream
of a sheen of black latex.
It was seven at night
and you could taste the difference of the air
But there was only one thing I wanted to taste
Only one thing
I wanted to sink my teeth into
And the wanting and knowing I would not
made it taste
Even better.

DUMMY

Sometimes

I want to come up to the stage
With a dummy
Rest him on my knee
And let him do the talking
Let him spit it out
The poetry
From his shiny
Plastic face
I could bow his head
At the end and let him
Take the acclaim and applause
I feel sure
his little mouth
would curl up at the ends.
I could even throw his arms into the air
Have him blow kisses at the crowd.
The strange thing is
The audience would probably
Believe
that it had
really come from him.

ENGORGEMENT

I got out of bed

went down for a coffee
sat in the sun for five minutes
Then began to write.
I write because I have to write
It is what I am.
I don’t always want to
 but you know how it is.
I opened up my email box while I thought about starting.
There was a message
a message about penis enlargement pills
Other claims were this
  Increase in penis length by 1-3 inches
  Increase in penis width by 20%.
  Aids in preventing Premature Ejaculation.
  Achieves longer, rock hard erections
  All gains in penis length and width were 100% permanent
It made me feel better after all
I could be trying to sell penis enlargement pills
So I finished this poem 
and knocked off another.
And thanked god I was a writer.


GASMAN

I heard a loud banging at the door so I opened the window as I got out of the shower

And shouted down to the gasman.
“Has she got any knickers on?”
He looked at me for a while
as if he was about to shout some abuse at me.
“Marc where is the keys?”
I found the keys and opened the door.
“Too late to start tidying up now woman, you have been caught out again.” I said.
I opened the door
and the gasman went straight to the meter and got out quick.
“Hang on I shouted do you want a cup of tea?”
“No, you are okay.”
And our first visitor in a few months
had gone.

HAMPSTEAD

I don’t
Really know
what brought me to Keat’s house on a Saturday afternoon
for a poetry reading
but
here I was.

One guy got up
And did a few poems
About Keats
Before he started
he gave us some background.
He told us about Keat’s wife.
Who was called Fanny
And he told us a bit about the house.
Then he said.
“So Keats would go out looking for fanny.”

I started to laugh

But no one else did.
“Who is that sniggering?”
“It is that old guy at the back.”
I said as I threw my head over my shoulder.

MORT

I want to work in a mortuary.

Tickle toes and tags.
Jump out at people as they turn corners.
Boo, only me.

Paint clown faces on them.

Sit them around tables and have parties with them.
Put hats on them and dress them in fancy clothes.

Talk to them about my problems.

Pretend that they are listening to me.
Do you really understand, I might ask them?
Nod their heads up and down.

And when I am sick of them, they can take them away

and bury them.
Then I will have new friends.

NUN TOO DIFFERENT

I want to wake up in a convent.

No T.V. no nothing.
White walls and women.
I would snuggle into bed with them, a different one each night.
Maybe I could work my way up to the mother superior.

What about if they are all lesbians, what would I do then?

Maybe they would throw me back, back into the street.
Be gone you awful man, they might say.
Be gone and don’t come back.

My dream ruined, where would I go.
Wander parks and fields.
Sleep underneath trees.
Look at strangers with my dog eyes.

Just another casualty of life.

You cannot help these people.
That is what they would say.
And maybe they are right.

People have helped me over the years.

But I have turned their help away.
I don’t know why.
Now they help me no more.
Maybe I will wake up in somebody else’s body
with somebody else’s life.
I bet that I could fuck that life up too.

TOILET HUMOUR

Last night I told a man about my turds

how they do not float anymore.
A long time ago
they floated and danced about in the pan.
Now they are dead and lifeless.
That is what I told him and he laughed.
He enjoys these types of stories and I enjoy telling them to him.

I knew it was him when he entered the toilet.

I know his movements from place to place.
The toilet is a very important place to him.

Once I was having the same type of conversation with him

but I did not notice that he had left and someone else had entered in his place.
“What’s that mate what are you talking about.”
That is what he said with uncomfortable words.

I told him that I was talking with someone else and pulled my pants up and left quick.
“Oh, okay” he said in a deep voice.
He started to break wind
and I had to hold my hand over my mouth to stop laughing
as I hurried out.


VOYEUR

That is what they called him in the paper.

Twenty years ago they would have called him a peeping tom.
He was trying to see more of women that he did not know.
That is what the papers said.

Does it live in all of us, the desire to see women, see them naked.

Look at them.
I don’t know whether he is in prison now.
The peeping tom but if you are in the papers – how good is it going to get.

He was drilling holes in the ladies shower rooms, that’s what they said.

In the papers.
I wonder if my name will ever be
in the papers.

I saw a man on the tele who left court with a tesco’s bag on his head.

I did not know what he had done.
Perhaps he was another voyeur.

Sometimes, I feel as if I have been asleep for a hundred years

and have woken in a different century.

IT IS A BOY

Just as I finished

a strange thought entered my head.
The thought was
‘Child benefit’.
I am not sure where it came from
but that must be a good  sign
don’t you think?

I laughed to myself

Like I
am the only one
who truly understands me.
Which, of course is true

She did not even ask me what I was laughing about

As I dismounted
And went to wash it in the sink.
I guess that she does not care too much.
Maybe it will be a girl this time
You just never know.

JUDGE JUDY

I think that I am falling in love with Judge Judy.

It only started today
she laughed her little laugh
the one that shoots from the side of her face gently
And that’s when I knew.
How I would love to sit up there with her on the bench
Maybe we could hold hands.
Maybe I could place my hand on her thigh as she deliberated.
I could slam the hammer down and shout
ORDER, ORDER I SAY
DAMM YOU JUDGE JUDY IS TALKING.

Maybe she would sack the big black dude and let me do his job.

You know
that one that shouts out the case number and calls the plaintiffs forward.

I could look at Judge Judy every day and smile my love into her.

She does scare me a bit though when she starts shouting
But I see a warmer side to her of course.
After all
She is always fair and true and just and
You know
That is such a rare quality these days
Especially for                       a woman

MADMAN

A message came over the tannoy of the shopping centre

while I was peacefully drinking my coffee.
Could patient Miller
please return to the info point.

For a second,

in my mind
I could see the faceless Miller
running down the shopping centre
screaming and shouting
and trying to lick and kiss women
Only restricted by a strait jacket.

Nobody else

seemed to be that concerned
about the announcement on the tannoy.

As I finished my coffee   

I was sure that I had not heard the last of patient Miller.

Later

at the other end of the town
I saw a man who paced up and down.

He was dressed for winter in June

and I was fairly sure that it was him.

He even came over and stood right beside me

and I was sure he was going to say something to me.

It reminded me of the day before

while I was sitting in a bar in Shoreditch.
A man came up to me and asked me for money.

There must have been 20 people

all sat in the front of the pub
but he came up to me
asked me and then turned around
and walked away up the road
as if I was the only one there.

Just me

and him.
I looked at Miller a few more times
and decided not to chance it
so I got up
and walked away.

PANTS

I went to the toilet and done my business.

I wiped and wiped
but the brownness remained.
So, I wet the tissue
and wiped it around and around.
Sometimes my fingers can go through the paper.
Then my arse got too close to the hair dryer
and it set it off.
I jumped around quickly,
startled,
then all the toilet paper started to fly around the toilet.
Eventually I gave up
and pulled my sweaty pants
and 2 pairs of shorts up
and left.

URGE

I had a strange desire to lift up the skirt of the black woman

who stood in front of me on the tube.
I do not know why
she was not particularly young
or attractive.
Christ knows what would of happened if I had actually done it.
I could not imagine it to be have been a pretty site.
What if she had no knickers on at all.
Maybe it was wash, wash day.
Although I did not see them
I am fairly sure that they would have been white.
I do not really understand where these strange urges come from
or when they will return or stop
or how much trouble they will get me into.
But time
Will tell.

JOHNNY

In the shop,

I pick up some condoms
and a leg of lamb.
I stand behind the very young girl and her mother.
I move around them
and put my things on the belt
just as the queue comes to a grinding stop.
The young girl looks at my shopping
and she starts to smile and moves around a lot
and I get the feeling
that I might be here, a long time.
Later in the day
I weave through the traffic on my way to work.
Even though
I am in no real hurry.
Biggie’s crack commandments
blast through the car.
As I pull up.
I see a woman in pantyhose
with a red skirt
She just slides by.
I leave the music blaring
as I search my car.
Even though
I have no idea what I am looking for.
A man approaches me
as I turn the music off.
He turns and walks away.
Later that night I laugh
and think about the soiled condom in my pocket
and where I should leave it.

MANNEQUIN

As I I walked through M and S

I had a deep desire to punch the mannequin very hard
Maybe bend right into him
lower my head
so I could deliver some combination punches
into his plastic six pack.

I wonder if I could break him

Make him cry.
I also wonder how long it would take
until the security guard rushed over
“Come on you two break it up.”
And then his realisation that one of us is made of plastic.
One of us is not alive.

BID TV

I turned on the tv

As I flicked through
I stopped at a shopping channel
I stopped because I could see the woman’s legs.
She said,
that she would not put anything
into her mouth
if it did not smell right.

I laughed a little

before moving to other channels.

Then I turned the TV off and fell into a coma.

I slept till twelve and could have slept more.

I got up had some food and took a crap.

I looked around at all the mess everywhere.
Plugged the phone back in
and started to write
but the girl’s legs stayed in my mind.
How I would love to be able to touch them
Maybe even lick them.

BIGGIE

As I finished

I thought that I could see the future.
I could see myself at the hairdresser’s later.

“What have you been doing this morning love?”

“Rodgering the woman.”
“What’s that love.”
“Oh yes, rodgering my good lady.”

Later I got into my car with my woman.

Biggie Smalls and method man came on the CD.
I asked her
if she wouldn’t mind calling me Biggie from now on.

She did not answer

She just smiled at herself
The way she does
As I saw the thoughts
come through
her green shiny eyes.

FIFTY

I see a story in the gazette.

‘73 year old woman in snatch horror’

The story stays with me

For longer than it should

I look at my hair in a mirror

it looks a mess

I get a coffee

then wash the lipstick from my face.

Earlier in the day

I was tempted to drive
into the side of a lorry
as it crossed the round about

I look into fifty women’s eyes

None of them look back.
Maybe I am invisible
no wait
maybe
I am dead

WRITER

Tie me to a tree

and pull my pants down.
Let them hang around my ankles.

I hope that I would not have the same pants on

that I had on today.

They were white

but had brown stains from the top to the bottom.

Leave me on the tree

until I am cured or dead.
I don’t really care what type of tree it is.
The bark can be quite hard on some.

Last year

I climbed a tree for the first time
in thirty years
I guess.
People probably thought
that I was trying to see into somebody’s window.

Catch a glimpse of a young woman

getting out of the shower.
But I don’t want a glimpse
I want a real good look
And a feel too

ONE FOR THE ROAD

I pass a glove on the floor

on my way to the bar.
I look into a girl’s eyes
as I go in.
I watch the barmaid
as she pulls down on the lever
that gives me my first beer of the day.

She watches me

watching her.
I give her the money
for the cheapest beer in the place.
She smiles at me
I move away from the drunk at the bar
and go and sit down.

I start to think about chancing the toilet

after a while
I realise that I cannot wait any longer
so down I go.

I hang my jacket
inside the toilet
and think of the book
where the guy had his coat stolen
while he was taking a shit.

I lower myself onto the toilet

and straight away
the lid starts moving from side to side

I get up and felt the wetness on my arse

and wondered whose piss I have been sitting in.
I went back upstairs
and finished my beer
got another
and walked back out
out into the rain
and the wind.

RAY

I looked at myself in the full length mirror.

Then I took my trunks off.
What a creature I am
Am I.
I even look awkward stood up.
My dick and balls
Hanging towards the earth.

My tats tell me how long I have lived

My ears are as red and hairy as ever.

I think of what Ray said last week.

But I never think about my words too much.
Only the general theme
of them.
They used to be all about waiting.
Now
I think
I may have waited
Too long

RETIREMENT

As I ejaculate

the man knocks on the door.

I know that he is delivering my books

even before I see
or hear him.
I look out of the window and see him walking away.
I can’t chase him down the street because of my near erection.
He may have me charged with attempted rape
or even worse he may try to take me up on it.

The phone goes

and it his him I am sure of it.
I fumble for my phone
just as I find it
it goes off.

The man who leaves the message tells me

that he has my books.
It takes me five minutes
to receive the message
and another five to get the phone number.

By now

he must be thirty miles away
with my books.

I phone him

but of course I don’t mention why I could not open the door.
Thirty minutes later

he brings my books

and I know that my career
is at an end……………………..

v

I had a desperate desire to ask her

what her middle name was

In fact I did

I was wondering
what the v stands for in your middle name, I said.

But of course

I had already made my mind up
Even though
she did not tell me.

SEMEN ABLE

A thought comes to me

As I walk around the town centre

I wonder what it is like

to walk around
with semen inside you

I guess that I would have to turn gay to find out

What about a child growing inside you.
What would that feel like
I guess I am never going to know about that
But wait what about the gay guy who had a baby
They implanted it into him.
He can have life and sperm in him at the same time.
I had to stop thinking about these things so I went for a coffee

I walked in and order a roasted hazelnut latte.

“That will be 2.35 please.” Says the girl
I raise my card to my face
and ask her
where she wants it.

I am sure I see a little smile on her face

“Slip it in there.”
She says.
“It would be my pleasure.”
I say
as I look for the smile
that does not come.

SLIDDER

I sat there with the old masters

Really because
I had nowhere else to go
or be.

I took my shoes off

and aired my feet a little bit.

They did not smell too good

I noticed the floor underneath my feet.
Varnished wood.
shiny

When I was a boy

I would take my shoes off
and run and run as fast as I could
then slide,
slide for as long as my feet would take me.

I don’t think they would let me do it now.

What a shame.
Maybe I would get half way down
before they came over to throw me out.
I could tell them
I am a boy
trapped in a man’s body.
Come on
Let me be that child again
Just one more go.

OLD GIGOLO

Yesterday a woman

Offered me a hundred quid for sex
Not bad for a 45 year old bloke
I guess.
She was knocking on a bit
But not too bad
I have certainly had worse
A lot worse.

The next day

I thought about becoming a male escort
I could dust off some of my love poems
And throw them in as a bonus.

Yea it is a job I could go for

Tips and perks

But you know

 the only thing that puts me off
Is all those women falling in love with you
And ringing you up day and night
and asking you to tell them
that you love them.
No
I am going to have to give it a miss.               What a shame

MANHANCER

I walked into the supermarket

to buy some condoms.
They had one of those large plastic cases around them
so i would have to ask some young girl to open
it up for me.
In the end i went to another supermarket
and picked up the manhancer in a small box.

I went to the self checkout and scanned
the item and put it in the bag.
The machine began to speak to me
"Approval needed, approval needed."
So i went over to the woman
to see if she would approve
my manhancer.
When i turned back to the machine
some old boy had jumped up to my self-checkout.
And was loading his stuff in the bag with the manhancer.

I walked straight out of the shop

and left him to do the explaining either to
the checkout girl
or to his wife when he got home.

POSTMAN

I stood in the front room

got an urge to pull my trousers and pants down.
So down they came.

Then i started to wave my prick around

and shout
"Hello, hello out there."

Then there was a clunk through the letter box
and i saw some parcels on the floor.
I pulled up my pants
the quickest I have ever done

Then the postman walked by.

It was a good job for him
he did not come the other way.

PALACE

How I would love

to break into Buckingham Palace
find my way to the queen's toilet
and curl up a beautiful floater
and leave it in there festering
and bobbing up and down
then
hide behind the door
and wait for the queen to come in.
"Oh my god Phillip how could you have left such a thing in here."
Then i could slip out and leave Philip
with
the blame and the shame.

SHEILA

The lady offered me a free sample of yeast extract on bread.

“It is cheaper than marmite and just as good.” She reassured me.
As I eat my yeast extract I mentioned that she looked cold.
“I am freezing.”
“Do you want me to warm you up Sheila?”
“I forget that people can read my name.  Is it a service you are offering?”
“I like to warm ladies up, especially, during the night, when they get cold. I could leave you my number and you could call me up - day or night, whenever you needed me. I am on call 24hrs a day just like a doctor.”

She looked at me for a while without saying anything.
I finished my yeast extract
and could not help but think about what everybody says about marmite
You either love it or hate it.
“Thanks for the yeast extract, I don’t like to offer my services twice, so I best get going and thanks again.”
I didn’t look at Sheila as I walked off
and I don’t feel she looked at me either.

OLD DRUNKEN WOMEN

Two old girls

started to shout at me in the street
As if I was deaf

“Where is the pub?”

“There is one there.”

“No we want the pub.”

“You are desperate for the pub I understand.”

And I patted her on the back.

“No we want the pub.”

“Well you can start in there and ask for another one if you are going on a bit of a pub crawl or if you fancy going on a bender. Go on in you go.”

“No we are not going on a bender we just want to know where the pub is.”

“It is okay I understand we have all been that way sometimes all you need is a drink.”

I walked off as I saw them shaking their heads and looking for the pub.