Secret Agent Artist

I’m lying in bed
eating my forth ice cream,
when I get a text from an acquaintance
I haven’t seen for ages.

Having completed her 4th degree
in medically related sciences,
she has been spending the last year
seriously training as an Olympic Athelete.

She, and her fantastically attractive husband
will be flying out to Africa to volunteer on a
high powered, seriously important
UN governed project. She will be swimming

10 miles at my local gym -
the one across the road from me, that I never go in -
would I like to sponsor her?
I drop ice cream on the bed.

****

I’m going through bank statements
when my father rings to tell me
he’s invested all his money (my inheritance)
in a high class, can’t go wrong, fail safe

Angora Rabbit Breeding Facility. Unfortunately
the facility, has been very badly hit
by an unprecedented outbreak of
Mxamitosis. He and my mother

are now destitute, and urgently needing
somewhere else to live. Could they come and
kip on the floor of my council bedsit?
no pressure for the bed, he’s sure

my mother’s arthritis - will only hurt a bit.
He’s not sure how long they’ll need to stay
but is certain we’ll all get along swimmingly.
The taxis’ waiting. He’s got Angora Jumper for me.

I like Bank Holiday Mondays in bookshops
drinking coffee and reading library books.

I’ve never understood the way they sell sunglasses,
or The Daily Mail - but I like that they keep

a small grand piano for miniature playing.

I like watching men in suits buy guides to Italy
from attendants with butterfly painted faces.

I like the pensioners on three for two
and the kids colliding in biographies.

I like the cycle home,
summer heat hitting shoulders.

I like Bank Holiday Mondays.
Dislike Tuesdays.

Another day it smells of coffee:
the kind my mother found whilst traveling,
brought back with her from the islands
discovered on her cruise.

It fills a warm house,
the inside cuff of a woolen cardigan;
sitting on a bus, waiting anxious
it would comfort you.

Hope tastes like a cough sweet,
reminds you of the time you lay in bed,
sits on your tongue, hums like a gun,
an alpine forest, sharp

ice cube. It’s a pike gliding
or a small boat
bobbing up and down
on a broad horizon, green land

rising into view.
It’s a bell ringing, sail stirred
blue sunlight over hull. Hope
would anchor you. Touching it,

you’d feel dunes -
feathers, the clean bowl
of a silk bag, the balloon cord
that you tried to grab

but missed, as a child.
If hope was here
it would watch for you,
search hands, know -

which of us might need it most.
It would move quietly,
pressing string
into palms.

We can’t still
be awake - sitting on the sofa
with the cushions, pushing,
into the backs of our knees
like blanket stitching weed or poison ivy.
There are pink marks, like pressure sores
from sleeping in. This is enforced sleeplessing,
the army would be proud - would shine
bright lights into our eyes, lightly thumb
the purple bags. But we don’t sleep.
Like vampires we just sit -
on sofa cushions, pushing
sleeping hours away unclaimed.
We write, like someone else might pay
for words we scratch onto our screens -
not just us.

His two left feet
arms around her waist
hung like clubs, or ice picks;
wing men, flippers on a bird -
his hands were:
meaty, sweaty, pockmarked, sour
she guessed been drinking
since the hour
the place had opened - this too tall,
clumsy man
who’d not so much as asked
as fallen in her arms-
was deadlocked round her calves -
left her helpless
only option just to - half dance
half cart - him back across the floor
bright lights, sweaty palms,
half dance -
one - two
half drag -
three - four
the man -
with the two left arms,
dangling useless like a
third limb - a soggy narn,
gabbling senseless ‘bout his mother
or her bra - get your hands from off my
ah! the girl - with her strong right arm
decanted him into a stool
left him there to gurgle snooze.
The girl -
went back to dance,

The furniture dinosaur’s moving again.
Flexing it’s sections of oak paneled thigh,
raking it’s bar table - aluminum
clavicle over linoleum tiles.

The furniture dinosaur
only comes out when it’s dark; scrapes
stacked drawers
of shelved hearts.

Upstairs, in number 12 -
it’s swishing like a crocodile - dinosaur -
dancing: tapping out a beat
like a drummer with a stool.

The furniture dinosaur
knows how to move.

It’s doing the rumba
sashaying numbers
that would make you blush
if you could see them groove.

I’d like to
go up there
and tell it a thing or two -
but at times like these

it’s risky - far too unpredictable.

Another sleepless night. Another slice
of jam and bread and butter. At one
I make myself a cup of
dandelion water. Sip it as the seconds

slither into hours.

I used to eat apples before going to bed -
then my therapist said
they would keep me awake with their acid.
The bread -

is hardly a salve,

hardly a nytol, or blow to the head,
or chloroformed hanky.
None of things I might need to survive.
And I don’t even have any apples.

Not any more.
I don’t even buy them,
regularly

My parents are interned
on a cruise ship at Madeira -
I heard it on the radio,
sitting on the sofa:

“You’re parents are interned
in their cruise ship at Maderia -
they won’t be coming home
as prearranged to meet you”

and it’s just the sort of thing
that I’d expect to happen.
My parents with their tans,
Bermuda shorts and glasses -

my father saying “Margaret!
We never should have come here”
my mother saying “Paul!
Perhaps we should call Watchdog -

But I can see my mother
loving every minute,
so I’m almost sorry later,
when my father texts the message:

The embargo has been lifted
the ship is raising anchor
they’re leaving from the habour
They should be back by Sunday.

My parent’s were interned
on a cruise ship at Madeira -
but all tonight’s a party
and all the drinks are gratis.

My parents type out screens
of happy reassurance -
their sea legs are quite solid
and their souvenirs are lovely.

But I worry for their epic
of Odyssey adventure,
I worry for the bungalow
waiting back in Leicester.

I worry how they’ll cope
without the smell of sunlight -
the salty spray on linen
the boardwalks and the deck-chairs.

I worry now the sun
is setting on Madeira
and now the ship is edging
close across the water -

I worry like they’re zebras
returning from adventures -
Noah’s distant cargo
coming back to rest up -

How they’ll find their home.

I love you so much that I left you the last teabag.
There weren’t two, there was only one
and I left it you. That’s how much I love you.
And also how nice I am.

Don’t really want to get wet
but suspect that it’s warmer in there
than it is out here. I won’t wash my hair -

look, I’ve tied it back.
You shouldn’t wash your hair
if you’re putting it up.