the biggest failure on the high st since Woolworths.
88 years of underwiring, chandelier water sports,
grief-deep hearts and picnic wicker that shouts
Are You Being Served? a gloom that seeps
into the psychedelic fabric of the counterpanes,

administration, administration, administration.
the final nail and british homes all left bereft of 
Roses, the owl-shaped butter dish, towels that tower 
in spires of dry infants, the white embrace of advert-fresh
caucasions, jaunty bubbles and nose-pink skin.

depressing coffee and pain au... no, depressing 
pensioners in tans and beige, staring out at the cold 
playground, listening to the sound of sore replicants oh,
no hope for this store, the passing of time, the carpets
worn to nil- the shining desperation of a carriage clock.

Poundland the third.
Three kingdoms reigned over
by fake hair royals, a Charlie
Dimmock god- terrible and
just, plant ties for fingers-
doing the job for now. 

dream of the countryside in spring.
the birds with their songs and spaces.
we are so immersed in london now,
the fields have smoked into black-

to burning stubble. when will we be 
old enough to retire from the mall- 
if ever? faces always open, the lights
and music have infected us into 

staying. no forks or combines, no vivid
sun that yolks onto the top meadow in
black strips of ripped up tights, no cockerel
sounding out the death bell, nor silence.

The 50 pence drops
and it seems disconnected from
me. It is not mine, though
I realise as I pick it up and pass
it to the lady in front of me
that it is. I am a child, loose

change in my pocket, I had
assumed she was also. But
out comes her lady purse,
it is a brick with a movie star 
clasp, she unclasps it sort of
officious as if it is I stealing

from her. She is well to do
and I am ruffian, clothes never
sit upon me right and she can
tell it. The 50p slips into 
her void, gone forever- 
embezzled. Could have been

a tip for the chirpy girl who
makes an effort to make my
coffee sound like the most exciting
thing that has ever happened,
even in her brown uniform, 
here in Walthamstow, in the rain.

What do you call a cat in a chemist?

My favourite joke,

The only one I ever remember.

Apothecary bottles

with coloured potions 

and Mum gets her 

Nicorette there, six

months before her death. 

Le Maître chat ou le Chat botté

bags his rabbit, red as

lipsticks in the strip-lit aisles.

The Marquis of Carabas dreams

of the eighties, Anais Anais- 

the byways of Essex,

lost car trips.

rain sleeps vertically,
the scooby-doo

sea-footed crowds
slurp prints onto the

waxy floor. exoticoffee
holds them up, they

dance on the head of a
pin, camels, needles,

sharpened semaphores
pointed as poems,

coughed up, battled out,
as an april shower, and

also as plans, bulldozers
that run daggers for

ze trampolines.