KISSING THE FISH TANK (a.k.a. Some Flash Fiction Romance)

      He might have said, 'are you in love with a koi fish?' or just 'a koi fish?'. His bottom lip had a tendency to tremble.

            She might have said, 'I'm a koi mistress' or 'I am your mistress'. Her face was mostly obscured by the water due to the way she pressed up against the tank.

            He definitely asked, 'why are you kissing the fish tank?'

            She definitely answered, 'I'm not'. My guess was she was mimicking the koi fish.

            He laid a hand on her, saying either 'then you're leading them on' or 'then you're leaving me'.

            She touched his hand, saying either 'not just them' or 'not right now'. The refraction caused by the ripples of the koi fish's movements made it almost impossible to tell.
            I never once moved from my seat. I couldn't.

RICH WHITEHEAD IS A TWAT (a.k.a. The High Art of Circumstantial Graffiti Meets the Low Art of My Poetic Interpretation)

I despair but I'm not Rich.

Not Richard.

Not Dick.

How could you miss Dick?

Or zit?

A white head's a zit,

basically you missed zit dick

or rather dick zit.

A twat's far too lovely.

Lady genitalia.

You though,

wall scribbler,

graffiti person,

chalk mis-handler;

you're something else.

SITCOM CITY (a.k.a. A Poem I Wrote Over the Course of Months - Still Not Happy)

I know a guy
in Sitcom City.
He knows bookshops,
coffee shops,
clean bars
where single women congregate
alone, free and
hot.

I knew him from his laughter
that follows him, swallows him.
He never learns 
but that's the line,
ratings are high
in the limits.

He can't guarantee much,
he might even ruin you.
Your chances are weak
while the writing is kind.

It's this city, he'll tell you,
this rosy city
with its made-up figures
that dance among the arcs
of men like him
and some women too
though he's never met them.

I'm not sure if he cares about
the cigars he can
always afford or
the friends he
often fails.
The rain comes out through nozzles.

Everyone's open
while the city is clear.
The women smile,
await their cue
and go.
He sets them off.
We watch.
We've seen them.
We've seen this one.

The titles.
The laughter.
Run it or can it.
He's smoking jokes
and here we are
only listening,
listening hard.

THE BRANCH AND THE BABY BOOTIE (a.k.a. An Image from a Dog Walk)

          The hedge was messy at the bottom: twigs and leaves nuzzled into the cracks on the pavement. There was even an overgrown branch, curved and upturned, that hooked on to people's trouser legs as they passed by.
          One day a pink baby bootie slid out from one of those trouser legs. The branch was almost ripped apart. It fell limply on top of the fallen item until another leg snapped the branch clean off at the end and kicked it into the road.
          The branch continued to grow. It gouged its way into the bootie then slowly retracted, footwear still attached. In the wind, it kicks.

SHE COMPOSED HER OWN EPITAPH (a.k.a. A Rather Bleak Cut-and-Stick Poem I Made to Stem off Boredom)

She composed her own epitaph
to 'Black Los Angeles'
before the judge,
that child,
used her rage to seize
the endless hours.

Slickness,
he says,
is art.
Compose and you
kill it.

BOTTOM OF THE ATTENDANCE SHEET (a.k.a. An Exaggeration of Things I've Actually Written as an Exam Invigilator)

Tom arrived five minutes into the exam -
he had no extra time.

Corin turned up half an hour late -
she had no pen, black or otherwise.

Rufus went to the toilet for fifteen minutes -
he came back with a limp.

Corin asked for a calculator -
she was doing the history paper.

Emma was called out of the exam -
the man said he was a teacher.

I stepped outside the room briefly -
noisy hallways - adults this time.

Corin tried to trip me up -
she still had her bag beside her.

They all finished ten minutes early.

BASEBALL VOWS (a.k.a. Marital Sentiment Corrupted or Chipped Away into Confusing Sports-Like Talk)

My daring,
Oh, my daring battercap,
you teak me every day.
Each wood is as sweat as
the leaps that deliver them.
You growl,
I growl.
Your hind,
your delegate paddle,
lay it in mine
and let's fend our feature,
our feature that shuts up and be earned
the spouting bubs we've become through
funding each other.