Suburban witchcraft

Mischievous streak

Well-worn with

Longer than average

Locks.  Wardrobe

Slightly more black

Than is fashionable

But not out of place

For the morning commute

Small signs, nothing overt

Letting slip some things

Behind closed doors

To trusted friends

Over drinks

Nothing serious

A harmless habit

Sewing circles, book clubs,

Keeping a solitary cat

Growing the odd pot of herbs

Reading, cooking, stitching wishes

All perfectly normal pastimes

For a middle-aged mum

Refusing to pay too much

Attention to the pruning

Hedges running amuck

Except that one bush in the

Shape of a five-pointed

Blobby something

That could be a star

If you squint properly

Or perhaps a large flower

Who can say?

Getting into the spirit

Of the seasons

Treating Hallow’een as

Others might Christmas

A night in with family

Alive and not-so-much

Candles, cake, roast veg

Nuts and berries

Communing after dark

Orange face grin-split

To show off the light within

A toast to the wheel

That keeps turning

Year round

Springing from

Youthful dawn

To beldam and bonfire

Quiet and crafty

Safe as houses

Keeping things tidy

Communing with

One’s own nature

In the pleasant anonymity

Of the leafy suburbs

Attendant Needs

The man who cleans the ladies’ toilet
Tries to stay invisible
Knowing he’s unwelcome, and
His job is somehow risible

An overflowing bin too ripe
With gravid, bloody stink
The stains that form behind the pipe
The vomit in the sink

The woman who mops out the gents’
Is handy with her fists
As banging on the cubicles
Helps lovers to resist

Temptations of a toilet dweller
Keen to wet their beak
With sins of flesh on offer
Even seasoned will’s too weak

Where users of facilities
One tries hard to forget
Don’t pass too close, as ill at ease
Our bladders we regret

And silent in our tinklings
Groans and grunts are magnified
Graffiti grows in sprinklings
Where we defecate inside

Words and Music

There came a point in my teens
When the sounds of the world
Invaded my palate
Until I was choked
With a burning desire; to speak
What I’d swallowed; to say
Everything possible
Tear myself open
Screaming words
The world could understand
But at the age of minority
People rarely listen
So I sang melodies
Whose complexity spoke
Of a simple beauty
And we became friends
One day, the words may
Overtake me in my music
And the whole world will hear

A symphony in beige

The girl has faded from our view
As softly coloured, her disguise
Dilutes what mood from hat to shoe
She wore, before our very eyes
Until her person has took cover
In a shell of sticking gauze
And we no longer may uncover
Beauty swathed to match her pores
Almost naked she appears
And yet false modesty we see
She chose her palette – from her fears
Made two dimensions out of three