That Inevitable Question

A handful of commuters,

On the platform,

Waiting,

Were waiting,

A man -

Some bloke,

Walked past me,

And up to the self-service confectionery machine,

And started making noises: huh! huh! hoohauuh! hooh-hoh!

So..

I asked myself that inevitable question:

Should I turn around?

Should I turn around?

Do I really need to see why this man -

This bloke -

Is making these strange noises?

I decided:

No. No. I don't need to know at all why this man - this bloke - is still going,

Loudly now:

Huhoohahun! Hooah! Hooah! Huh!!

So,

I didn't turn around.

And then,

Of course,

I did.

He was shadow-boxing;

Shadow-boxing the self-service confectionery machine.

Ah! Ha!

I thought like Mister Clever:

Those are Kung Fu-like noises he's making:

Totally harmless.

Totally harmless,

Until he started beating the shit out of it.

Then he stopped and looked up.

At me.

Our eyes locked.

And it turned (for me anyway) like one of those westerns where a man -

Some bloke -

Walks into a bar,

And the piano player stops playing,

And the barman ducks behind the bar,

And some card players look up,

And one of them says:

We don't want no trouble mister ..

So our eyes locked.

I felt a trickle of oh shit! down my neck..

He nodded at me.

I nodded back.

And, with that,

Some quite enigmatic and elusive man-to-man understanding was reached.

Thank God for that.

Then,

He went back to punching the self-service confectionery machine.

The train arrived.

And he stopped beating the self-service confectionery machine:

He obviously had somewhere important to go.

And we both got on the train.

He sat across from me,

Picked up a discarded free newspaper to read,

And,

Read.

That probably made me ponder,

But ponder to ponder nothing much.

Slap Your Baby, Make It Cry

And please hush now -

TV volume up:

An important politician is orating himself,

To tears.

Off-the-wrist onanist:

Oral cavity inspiration.

So inspired, he is,

By his own words,

He's actually bringing himself to tears.

He's orating himself to tears.

Lips all a-tremble:

It's a site:

His vain of tears.

Explaining his "Nineteenth Way":

Journey..end of the night..hope..terror..better..balance..

prolapse..process..choice..vision..Nineteenth Way..economic suicide..

opportunity..equality..individuality..

love..enemies..deficit..defence..optimal..dental..reality..unblemished..the cancer of..

innocence..feral children..peace..diabetes..

positive change..traditional values..responsibility..hard-working families..torture..

crime..planet..paradise..terrorists..shoulder-to-shoulder..dreams..

us..them..more terrorists..green..immigrants..

war on..peace..God..joined-up..criminals..liberal elite..fiscal discipline..

community..

Me Prime Minister,

......Me,

..You,

......Me. Again.

......Prime Minister,

........Vote. Me.

..........Tomorrow!

Thank you..

..............................He's finished.

The possessed sway,

And chant,

And cheer.

And they cry a little too.

It's not nice.

And tomorrow I'll probably vote for this guy -

And his Nineteenth Way.

..So different, I bet, from The Eighteenth Way and The Third Way,

And the second way and the..

Balloons and streamers release, and,

One of those lite-rawk anthems blasts asinine thoughts on

believing in dreams if you reach for the something or other:

Sonic napalm for organ-gurning monkeys.

Who are these simpletons that watch this neo-fascist-like propaganda on TV?

I mean,

Apart from me?

Now this is where it gets really bad,

So turn your gaze away now if you're of a delicate disposition:

He's..

Wait for it..

He's holding someone's baby.

An evil parent has just handed him over their defenceless flesh and blood.

Bonding with nuclear blancmange - poor baby.

And now he's kissing the baby.

They say there's nothing worse than seeing a baby cry,

Oh yes there is:

Witnessing a sweet baby smile and gurgle at a corpsing vote-bandit.

The politician's vision:

Perfect 20/ vision,

Slap your baby,

Make it cry.

Presence

I'm facing the roads that didn't take,

And the blood flows ice-cold;

The present absences,

Summon up themselves,

Just like that.

Arising - eyes stark rockets,

"Look!" they point,

Down this road,

Then this one..

So, round-around and round the spaghetti roundabout we go.

Waltzing phantoms slide,

Shuffle around,

Blend into,

And vaporise, whistling through me,

Misting away:

Mist into mist;

They will never say goodbye.

Still Time For A Taco

And,

Although his blog poetry met with little success,

His serial killing career really took off..

Detective Panata shook his head,

Hissed sizzled air through his teeth,

And pulled out the gruesome murder-scene photographs,

Placing them -

One by one -

On the mock-Formica.

The poet's eyes:

Lights on but burglars at home -

Blank paged his inner-space haiku's:

Warping mirrors rhymed black holes backatcha.

Detective Panata tap-tap-tapped the photos,

And swilled another slurp of stream-driven caffeine;

Cobra curlicue vapour whirl-dervished hypnotic snake-charm weave out the Styrofoam,

Like a snoozing Icelandic deep-dreaming geyser,

Yadda yadda.

The detective leaned,

Lolling over blog-poet-maniac,

Like a polyester mack'd bat-gargoyle with vertigo,

"So just explain to me one thing okay?

Why?"

"Hm..mm..why..

Why?"

The killer-poet fish-eyed some mysterious event horizon,

Then:

"Well, why does anyone write poetry,

Deee-tec-tive?"

"Huh?

What?

Hoh: You think this is funny?

You think you're some kinda funny guy?

Is that it?"

"No detective, none of my stuff is funny:

That's the problem,

Deee-tect-ive."

"Oh I get it. I get it!"

"Yeah?

Then you're the only one detective Pan..watchaface.."

Detective Panwatchaface shook his head:

Sheesh, wait till the wife hears this one..

That thought graveyardshiftdrifted gears through Panata's wandering night,

Towards,

Well, towards a more domestic mystery:

Why the hell is she still with me..?

When I open the front door I half expect

..silence..

I need a Viagra just to take a leak..

But, she ain't gone sh

she.. she ain't gone..

She ain't gone..

Panata's head spinning like hamsters running on blancmange wheels,

Looked up, away,

Turning nowhere-to-nowhere,

And gumshoed out the interview room,

Nodding sagely to the uniformed sentry tilting at a droning air fan,

Outside the door.

And down the corridor he went..

I need some air.

I also need some hair!

He smiled to himself:

Now that rhymes -

And it's funny!

The paperwork:

That,

Can be done tomorrow..

..I need some hair..

Detective Panata chuckled slyly..

Oh boy..

So,

Panata strolled across the wet, soda lamp-lit car park:

Must've been raining earlier..

A sultry night sirocco breeze wafted and comingled

with the rattlesnakes' spelling bee.

A distant coyote howled, inevitably..

That's funny though:

A coyote?

Sirocco breeze?

Rattlesnakes?

Spelling bee?

What? In London?

Ho!

Maybe. Just maybe,

This whole global warming shit,

Really is for real after all..

Anyways..

Panata tut-tutted as he heaved himself into his sedan,

Clicked "drive",

And swept out the station house,

And..

Crashed:

Driving down the wrong side of the damned highway again.

So,

As his crushed radiator spluttered and spat,

Panata's eyes pnarpnaring -

Twinkled brightly behind his safety aviators:

I need some air,

And I need some new hair,

Oh,

Aaand, aaand:

I need a car repair.

Ho!

I'm gettin' really good at this shit!

Wait till I tell Wilma:

I'm a freakin' poet!

A crowd of regulation assholes began to gather round the turnpike.

"Okay, show's over.

Move on 'kay?

Move on nahh.."

The hustlers, pimps, showgirls, gamblers, drifters and off-duty strippers,

Shuffled back with their shopping baskets,

Into Tesco's..

Panata lit a cigaret,

And wiped away a small trickle of blood he noticed -

A red tear really -

Dripping a forlorn ruby down his zig-zag forehead..

He surveyed his car-wreck:

I'll have to file:

It's totalled..

They'll have my ass for this..

He stared down Main:

A couple of sirens from the uptown precinct were headed his way:

Oh jeez;

That's all I need:

The freakin' cavalry..

Panata allowed himself a smile.

Well,

Anyways,

Still time for a taco..

Spring

'tis spring,

And the heavens cloak London a trampoline bouncing skyscreen baby-powder;

The deep-daylight-deep shimmering star-seamstresses twill wisp-silver floss;

The sheer missionary angel-wing awning weaves a porcelain floating fractal azure frieze,

Like surf waves for angels,

The stars are coral,

And the moon an extraterrestrial snow island.

And yet, and yet,

London in springtime,

Still feels, for all the world,

Like the devil has detached, and,

Lowered, then,

Dropped the motherload of his very stench-packed testicles -

His wizened, black-hole frazzled, dripping bollocks,

Over this putrid silver -

Dah! Dah!

For under this alien, harsh Iberia,

Even the most enchanting women, solarised, have the look of serial killers.

London is springtime glistening

a wasteland of office plastic plant forests and a treated shit-packed river.

Yes, once dolphins were witnessed swimming in the Thames:

Whales sometimes land on a beach:

Doesn't mean they're looking for real-estate.

I once saw a flying saucer over London -

See any aliens living here?

For springtime in London,

Is as pointless as wasps;

As pointless as lemmings in Holland;

As pointless as afternoons,

And just as harsh,

Just as harsh.

For who, but the most evil omnipotent,

Would invent something as death-affirming as afternoons?

Yes, I'm looking,

I'm really looking.

Afternoon springtime in London:

A yellow halo,

No. Correction: a golden halo, glistening resplendent, over

a navy cloak of magentas, indigos, and turquoises,

But, still, it feels as tender as maggots fucking in bleach;

As life-affirming as a suicide bomber at the dentist;

As soft-warm as a Texan execution chamber.

It feels like that,

But worse:

Baking-close.

Springtime in London:

The sap rises venereal.

Even the most devout Hari Krishna troupe,

Weeps,

Dancing only to tamborines beating out

Joy Division,

And only if they're feeling very positive,

And only when their third-eye is firmly scoping the escape hatch to Nirvana.

My cappuccino has the taste of dragon-teat effluvia:

A brown pro-plaque vortex suckling me into hell-lite.

This croissant crunches my teeth.

Solar flares ray-burn and cattle-prod necks and blind eyes

through tube's glaring cateract windows:

A demented kid-god lazers his butterflies through the public transport magnifying glass.

Dear Christ, water-board me back into the plunging darkness -

Into the rat-infested megalopolis of London's chez-Dracula subterranean lagoons.

The poor Thames mermaids burn,

I'm witness:

A police boat gurgles,

As the divers haul one over-cooked stark dying beauty in;

One even respectfully swims back out again to rescue her harp,

strangled by weeds..,

The saddest of strings still somehow strikes its notes.

The cruel switchblade sunlight catches the harp strings weeping ethereal,

Koh-i-Noor size dew-drop tears dripping.

This is too much.

I turn away,

....