There was a halo of glistening moisture
around her radiant yet subtly shaded anus, shaded anus.
It was like one of those exquisite dewy sunrises
you sometimes get on the North East coast
usually in early to mid May,
though sometimes as late as June
if there’s been a long hard winter
as I’ve noted during hiking holidays in Angus….
That’s a place of worship and a sanctuary I thought
so I put my tongue in there
and sang
All Things Bright and Beautiful
My lover
wearing nothing but a hat
improvised from palm leaves
and turbanesque in shape
barbecues fresh sea bream
with the grace of a sultana.
She passes nothing but remarks
calls me dickhead, runt, alcoholic
five times a day
under her minaret
but is she sexy?
Oh yes….you bet !
She has the true grit of emery
if you rub against her long enough
you become smooth, French, polished.
A principled uva-pesca-vegetariana sultana
without her my every morning
would be a pig’s breakfast
of Stornoway Black Pudding
and offal, offal.
She’s disapproved, derided
disdained, disputed and disliked
since the day we first met
but do I love her?
Oh yes….you bet!
For that
and his stupefying passion
he was glad gorgeous and grateful
and then came hatred
as sure as darkness
creeps around a planet.
Once while clearing or cleaning
or somesuch
in a voice riven with
a craving for control
She said “It would
be good to have one place
where everything ends up”
Oh wouldn’t it just…….
That place was hatred
I’m hard-bitten
and long in the tooth
though plaque
has taken its toll
For 60 years
I was unhygienic
but now
I’m on a roll
Back then
at night no time…no time…too eager for love
next morning…too keen on the day
but now
I could floss for Scotland
once I’ve had my cheese souffle,
malay satay, congee, pate, steak flambe, cassoulet,
onion soup gratinee , chicken liver parfait
with sauce veloute then sweet cafe au lait
and my wickedest way
with Eve’s Pudding
….Anna Conda she said
wearing nothing but a florid feather boa
and a face like fizz
the tribe left years ago
while their crops still fruited
and Umberto the gold prospector
slipped away squalidly
to some other piece of fortune
and whoever happened to be around
dug him into a damp
hallowed malarial mound….
Umberto never found
much gold
and the Wa-na-na nation
moved downriver, got tee-shirts and flu
and died out
but you and I came, pale, protected
in jungle boots and close-weave khaki
and moist with a lust grown faraway
and we brought it here
and we were so hot together
we didn’t even need to undress
to make a happy ending
we placed our bed
30 yrs ago
we put items round it
the accessories of love
creams, cucumbers, eggwhisks and spoons,
silk ropes, diaphanous dreams
pornography and hope
and we set to it with gusto
sometimes you would leap into the air screaming
sometimes I would shake the walls with my cries
often we would wonder if the neighbours were disturbed
even though there were none until the next valley
Many summers followed in showers of birdsong
the windows wide as our legs so the sweet weather could enter us.
In winters the low warm lights caressed our thighs…
we crackled with frosts, thawed in the inner folds of our bodies,
chafed and scratched each other red with use,
stained and ruined ourselves.
The world was a tired sensual morning
dragging itself from us ….the hot deep mud of desire.
One year we moved the bed to a different room
The joy of a change. The joy of settlement.
You gave a shriek of indignant womanhood…
and left in hormonal terror
I moved the bed again
to a room that felt less lonely
but it didn’t work
the nights just rained constantly
the mornings grey with aftermath.
Other women came to try
this new position
but they got backache
or contracted fear
or they met your ghost
on the way to the bathroom
I became a prisoner here
chalking the months on the bedpost,
the touch of others irrelevant
the hope a curse
and when you came back
the jailers unlocked the iron gates
to let you in
chuckling,
sniggering obscenely
amongst themselves.
in the far east of the bed
she chuckled by lamplight
over unheard comedies
her haunches were mountains of milk
around wells of honey
and his dreams
were biblical
The bell strikes every time
a quarter-hour of night has gone
there have been two rain showers
and three times a milky moon
broke through soft cloud
like a highwayman
tapping my window-pane.
A woman shouted in a grey yard,
four lorries pulled their loads away,
setting their diesels
for another part of the country
and once, at four forty-eight, I dozed
then twitched awake again
regretting
I wasn’t with you.
You are the eye
of my Big Apple
the core of my world
a perfectly ripe
Cox’s Pippin
of a girl.
Dont let the wee tykes from up the road steal you.
The tax accountant from Atlanta
who called herself Georgia
had huge hard cylindrical nipples
a bit like rusted oil drums
Quite intriguing really
As I touched them
I shifted in the bed…
a little uncomfortable
and thinking of yours.
I suppose when strangers meet
on a train
you can’t expect perfection
and true there had been a time
when you were a stranger….
and we worked on that.
You can work on anything….
but in the morning
I realized Georgia
had thin shoulders
and a rather flat behind…
and that working with figures
doesn’t interest me.
