Soho

Shadowing the course of the river, The Strand streams out like an arrow straight into the heart of Trafalgar Square where Nelson in his thick, sweet-smelling, admiral’s coat watches over the Houses of Parliament. Then it becomes night. The yellow glow of The Lyceum is behind me. Tap-dancing along the shiny wet pavement I take the silk route to London neon-Xanadu. Horns catapult their way down Strand in an instant, and here I am, or was, left, right off the edge of a glittering black cab tarantula thing. Dangling off its door, a stain in the tumbling night. To Soho! Clattering down Soho's stone shoemakers’ streets to the wood-panelled walls of Norman’s Coach & Horses, where diaphanous shadows slip away from the light and into impenetrable corners of the bar. That's old Good Cheer lurching about the room red-faced and tipsy over there, hacking away at the honky-tonk piano to the beat of a bag-lady shuffle. She, outside waiting for drunks to pull the sun up onto their backs at dawn, and about then she'll slip her bony fingers down the back of cushions to check for pennies and needles stuck bent in the noses of smeared syringes. She should have a home to knit in. The lurid neon shudders, spins, and zaps on red brick walls, setting fire to the gargoyle faces of passers-by. Women in stone archways fan their heavy black eyelids like cypress branches and, wow!, they're all shimmering mirages in a parched throat. This bee-stung heart swells dangerously in conditions like these. I take a sip of coconut rum - the rumbling sounds of nightclub bass drums throbbing through lovers' silhouettes - it's a heatwave. Brings to mind the Lesbian poet Alcaeus - wet your lungs with wine, for the dog-star is coming around and everything is thirsty with heat. This city seems so open and yet, I know, so tightly-closed. Boys and girls, fresh pearls wobble and bop inside pink and white clams' shells, shimmying shut tight in their private London universe. Oh, lovely, look, it's The Kings Road Brigade wearing Nouveaux Pauvres t-shirts, and gurgling down magnums of Cristal - Krug and dangerous. That lemon meringue light and bubbly washing about the rosy tongues and finely-sculpted molars. Hark! Honky-tonk bells bowed and vocal cords stretched like a Winchester Goose, a packet of Mayfair and clanking gold chains shouts, “Give no quarter!” I adore all of this colour, and revel in sharing the night air of 8.674 million dreams. So, there I was, in Soho, bursting at the seams for this life, like a plump drunk bunch of cherries hanging heavy on the lobes of a dazzling debutante.

Solo Ovation (for Michael Wilde)

I was drawn into a beautiful and generous act
That everyone else saw as lunacy -
His solo standing ovation in the small hall.
Red as a windmill I shot up bewildered,

Standing too, at his side - Quixote and Panza.
My classical guitar teacher, Michael Wilde;

Bless his lonely Bavarian soul.

Lunch On A Quiet Day At Work

The Nero d'Avola from Sicily,
Black as squid ink,
Smelled of bananas and olives,
And tasted like chocolate coffee.
Sent me soaring over
The wet rooftops of London,

Out across the English Channel,
And over the Mediterranean Sea,
Where the sun drew a picture
As rich as a cornfield.

Autumn Haiku

Autumn's foolish gold,
You crackle your warning -
I shall not tread here again.

The Hotel Sibir in Novosibirsk

Just perhaps they need a Vegas-style crooner

In the Hotel Sibir,
To fill the empty stage

With woe and chanson.

The rest of her misty days passing

In a mirage of vodka

And cold herring.

Cream Puff

Cream puff
whipped up a storm
in the local newspaper.
Last seen going out to sea
on a raft of orange
reeds.

Bubbles Leaking Like Butterflies' Wings or Butterflies Make Fine Bread

He lies on her sofa and watches a bubble break in the air. The bubble's echo is slight, and he feels only a slight dewy feeling on the tip of his nose as it pops.

"I'm glad that long-forgotten tears are irrecoverable", she thinks.
A ray of sunshine slices through the next bubble.
Floating over from behind the damask sofa where he lies, languid like a puma.
A slippery little balloon made of gossamer floats between them. He stretches out his tongue and puts it in his mouth for pleasure.
Seems like a spotlight is in order to project light into the shadowy recesses of his mind.
She's seen indications of its emptiness.
"Show them oil slicks?", he would ask, "disaster areas in the head?" That didn't work for him, apparently.
Still, always, he sticks out his tongue, and licks the rainbow film off the latest bubble.
Her flickering and ever quick flame, lights and extinguishes in the hefty droop of an eyelid.
In the time it takes to lift .000000013 kilograms of eyelid into the open position, he finds himself in the off position.
Butterflies jettison fuel from their wings as they come in for an early landing.
Otherwise the landing will be too heavy for their fragile bodies; snap in the middle upon impact.
That would be an awful sight.
Poor un-spun bees, their stripes unravelled to be used as ribbons for the prince's birthday presents.
Perhaps he'll use them for wallpaper.
Paste them up around the walls of his favourite salon.
Perhaps she will leave tonight for good.

The Restaurant S Works In

Latin lovers sweating
Over hot plates,
Flashing white, licking lips,
And tongues-a-dancing.
The kitchen door beats,
The wings of an Albatross,
And kitchen clatter spills over
Into the dining room.
Hey Vittorio!
Unfurl that ship's sail
To wrap around his throat.
This hairy beast is
To be served his fourth plate
Of spogalomato.

Plucking The Tomatoes

Plucking the little tomatoes
Off their vine this afternoon
For breakfast,

And smelling them,
I whistled with joy.

Violets

Our bright blue car,
A giant shimmering heart
With four liquorice wheels.
Beats a track around the coastline,
Listening to Puccini's Butterfly at top volume.
Three cases of good dark wine on the back seat;
The stuff that looks like wet terracotta and smells of violets.