If your feet are cold
put them in my armpits.
If your feet are cold
put them behind my knees.
If your feet are cold
put them in my mouth.
I will shiver until I stop.
© Dave Pickering
Saturday, 25 April 2009
This kiss has missed its target
Don’t tell me you’re still so sure, now the sound surrounds
these streets and the wagons don’t roll any more.
We built up our fires and hoped the arrows wouldn’t fly.
The feathers stuck to washing lines and the distant sound of windchimes.
Do you remember when we walked under that ladder
just to dare the bricks to fall?
I used to think that holding your hand would make me feel
like an astronaut walking on the surface of the moon.
The seasons pass too soon when you are with me.
If you close your eyes and think about it, it’s like infinity:
too large to think about.
Breast strokes through weightlessness.
All this will end my friend,
as surely as water falls from the sky,
as surely as tower blocks rise;
everyone is reaching far beyond their height
everyone is so desperate to be free
of all this gravity.
Breast strokes through weightlessness.
The light looks so strange this early in the morning
and surely we should take it as a warning,
and surely we should wrap ourselves up inside this city,
forget all about its history,
forget it and burrow into this heavy grey soul.
What did we ever really know?
Breast strokes through weightlessness.
You are beautiful when you forget yourself.
Hold my hand and tell me made up secrets,
I’ll whisper your old names
and we can imagine a passion.
This kiss has missed its target.
© Dave Pickering
these streets and the wagons don’t roll any more.
We built up our fires and hoped the arrows wouldn’t fly.
The feathers stuck to washing lines and the distant sound of windchimes.
Do you remember when we walked under that ladder
just to dare the bricks to fall?
I used to think that holding your hand would make me feel
like an astronaut walking on the surface of the moon.
The seasons pass too soon when you are with me.
If you close your eyes and think about it, it’s like infinity:
too large to think about.
Breast strokes through weightlessness.
All this will end my friend,
as surely as water falls from the sky,
as surely as tower blocks rise;
everyone is reaching far beyond their height
everyone is so desperate to be free
of all this gravity.
Breast strokes through weightlessness.
The light looks so strange this early in the morning
and surely we should take it as a warning,
and surely we should wrap ourselves up inside this city,
forget all about its history,
forget it and burrow into this heavy grey soul.
What did we ever really know?
Breast strokes through weightlessness.
You are beautiful when you forget yourself.
Hold my hand and tell me made up secrets,
I’ll whisper your old names
and we can imagine a passion.
This kiss has missed its target.
© Dave Pickering
Frozen Milk
You were the last thing I thought of when I fell asleep
but in the morning I couldn’t remember you
no matter how hard I tried.
Memories against my cheeks –
.......................................................cold
.................................................................salt
...................................................................... ..forming.
There’s cyanide at the centre of these sweet fruits.
I pick out the pips and mash them.
When I’ve had enough I’m going to give you a taste.
Stop your heart. Spin your head.
And you will
........................ ..never
....................................... wake
.......................................... ......... up.
The milk on my cornflakes freezes,
I smash it with my spoon.
And I smile.
© Dave Pickering
but in the morning I couldn’t remember you
no matter how hard I tried.
Memories against my cheeks –
.......................................................cold
.................................................................salt
...................................................................... ..forming.
There’s cyanide at the centre of these sweet fruits.
I pick out the pips and mash them.
When I’ve had enough I’m going to give you a taste.
Stop your heart. Spin your head.
And you will
........................ ..never
....................................... wake
.......................................... ......... up.
The milk on my cornflakes freezes,
I smash it with my spoon.
And I smile.
© Dave Pickering
Done
And now there is someone watching all the time.
So intent on every little action.
Pinpointed. Each word will count.
The overseer you employed on that day
you became aware of yourself
is rising up the ranks too fast.
Soon he will be your boss.
Your contract will be altered without your knowledge.
Your job description will be changed.
Your work will be found wanting.
And you will think, “why?”
There wasn’t even a job vacancy. That guy just knocked at your door. You asked him in. He offered to do little things. Make himself useful round the house. You thought you would help each other out. You didn’t give him much thought. And he’s built this structure around you and he thinks it was for the best. This wasn’t meant to change you, he didn’t mean to make a mess. He just thought you could do with someone keeping an eye on you. It all started with him having your back, he never meant to climb on it. But that’s the way things change as the clay gets moulded and your shape is changed. Just too damn conscious of yourself.
Let it go and take a breath,
shake it out of your chest.
and watch yourself stop
thinking so much.
© Dave Pickering
So intent on every little action.
Pinpointed. Each word will count.
The overseer you employed on that day
you became aware of yourself
is rising up the ranks too fast.
Soon he will be your boss.
Your contract will be altered without your knowledge.
Your job description will be changed.
Your work will be found wanting.
And you will think, “why?”
There wasn’t even a job vacancy. That guy just knocked at your door. You asked him in. He offered to do little things. Make himself useful round the house. You thought you would help each other out. You didn’t give him much thought. And he’s built this structure around you and he thinks it was for the best. This wasn’t meant to change you, he didn’t mean to make a mess. He just thought you could do with someone keeping an eye on you. It all started with him having your back, he never meant to climb on it. But that’s the way things change as the clay gets moulded and your shape is changed. Just too damn conscious of yourself.
Let it go and take a breath,
shake it out of your chest.
and watch yourself stop
thinking so much.
© Dave Pickering
Call and Response
Sitting in the bath
stewing in the heat
steam rising up to touch my feet
that lie flat against cold tiles.
In the other room
a flute is calling to a voice
that has been folded up
in a cupboard for years.
She is wearing it again.
My mother sings Chopin:
carefully taking out each note,
playing it on her flute,
singing it back in a parrot call and
response, mirror images
that fill the house and move through the walls
and become the air and water that surround me.
The notes are being tidied up and sorted out,
whittled down like wood on a lathe
and I am surprised at how beautiful she can sound.
Suddenly,
momentarily,
I see her as she might have been
when she was 14 singing in choirs
and all the stories I’ve taken with salt,
all the sudden cackles and eruptions
that have made me flinch through the years –
like salad dressing made with too much vinegar –
it all folds itself into place.
And I realise that you need
to isolate the patterns
so you can see their structure.
It is possible for someone to sing wonderfully,
yet forget how.
© Dave Pickering
stewing in the heat
steam rising up to touch my feet
that lie flat against cold tiles.
In the other room
a flute is calling to a voice
that has been folded up
in a cupboard for years.
She is wearing it again.
My mother sings Chopin:
carefully taking out each note,
playing it on her flute,
singing it back in a parrot call and
response, mirror images
that fill the house and move through the walls
and become the air and water that surround me.
The notes are being tidied up and sorted out,
whittled down like wood on a lathe
and I am surprised at how beautiful she can sound.
Suddenly,
momentarily,
I see her as she might have been
when she was 14 singing in choirs
and all the stories I’ve taken with salt,
all the sudden cackles and eruptions
that have made me flinch through the years –
like salad dressing made with too much vinegar –
it all folds itself into place.
And I realise that you need
to isolate the patterns
so you can see their structure.
It is possible for someone to sing wonderfully,
yet forget how.
© Dave Pickering
Wait A Second
The thud thud thud of the underground clock
falls down down down like a dripping
tap, as digital seconds turn into
each other, each making
the distance smaller
until we are
together.
© Dave Pickering
falls down down down like a dripping
tap, as digital seconds turn into
each other, each making
the distance smaller
until we are
together.
© Dave Pickering
The City in April
The bluebells have pushed their shoots
between the woodchips and broken glass;
they have pushed their way out
and they shake their silent songs
(Let them drink)
towards the sides of your eyes as you walk to work.
These wild scattered blue splotches contrast
the neat bushes sculptured around their beds
by tired and uninspired council gardeners.
(New life hangs heavy.)
Everywhere you go the women are in bloom too;
their bellies full of insistent new life,
and now their body is crushed against sweating strangers,
squashed and staggered in this rush hour incubation.
(You keep moving.)
Loose summer dresses have become tents and canopies.
Rounded shapes are the only shapes to be seen in heavy black burqas.
All races and cultures are united in this need to breed
and here in the heat the women are feeling their burden.
The sun comes out in time for lunch
and cooks the cold concrete
but the mornings still makes you shiver.
Boil in a bag.
Shake in the air.
You keep moving.
There is a contradiction between the constancy of the city
and the changing tides of the seasons
that overlap and pull everything and everyone in different directions:
We wash away.
Bluebells find a way.
New life hangs heavy.
The winter is remembered in baking radiators and
the summer comes in through the greenhouse windows.
The offices are melting in the clash of forces.
Close your eyes.
Close your dry eyes.
Let them drink.
© Dave Pickering
between the woodchips and broken glass;
they have pushed their way out
and they shake their silent songs
(Let them drink)
towards the sides of your eyes as you walk to work.
These wild scattered blue splotches contrast
the neat bushes sculptured around their beds
by tired and uninspired council gardeners.
(New life hangs heavy.)
Everywhere you go the women are in bloom too;
their bellies full of insistent new life,
and now their body is crushed against sweating strangers,
squashed and staggered in this rush hour incubation.
(You keep moving.)
Loose summer dresses have become tents and canopies.
Rounded shapes are the only shapes to be seen in heavy black burqas.
All races and cultures are united in this need to breed
and here in the heat the women are feeling their burden.
The sun comes out in time for lunch
and cooks the cold concrete
but the mornings still makes you shiver.
Boil in a bag.
Shake in the air.
You keep moving.
There is a contradiction between the constancy of the city
and the changing tides of the seasons
that overlap and pull everything and everyone in different directions:
We wash away.
Bluebells find a way.
New life hangs heavy.
The winter is remembered in baking radiators and
the summer comes in through the greenhouse windows.
The offices are melting in the clash of forces.
Close your eyes.
Close your dry eyes.
Let them drink.
© Dave Pickering
Tuesday, 15 April 2008
The Inside
Looking through the metal frosted glass,
watching people on pavements walking past.
You are a pigeon trapped in a supermarket:
flapping wings and crashing into faces,
desperate for space and for food.
Looking through the metal frosted glass,
watching people on pavements walking past.
You move through the city in a coffin of metal
that thinks it can think and can feel.
© Dave Pickering
watching people on pavements walking past.
You are a pigeon trapped in a supermarket:
flapping wings and crashing into faces,
desperate for space and for food.
Looking through the metal frosted glass,
watching people on pavements walking past.
You move through the city in a coffin of metal
that thinks it can think and can feel.
© Dave Pickering
Hole
I am digging your grave.
...................Worms still moving after the sharp edge of
.life has thrust into them,
....................pulling at the ground like roots.
The
......thin
............black
....................loose
...........................earth
.........................................covering orange clay
.........................................................packs itself in and clings -
.splitting..........it..........needs..........pick..........axe.........motions.
The sweat running
down my back
reminds me of the rivers
we used to walk by.
Your death is
under my fingernails.
It hasn’t even
happened yet.
move so well now;
you shake when you stand
if you stand at all.
I put my shovel down.
I pick up the fork.
© Dave Pickering
...................Worms still moving after the sharp edge of
.life has thrust into them,
....................pulling at the ground like roots.
The
......thin
............black
....................loose
...........................earth
.........................................covering orange clay
.........................................................packs itself in and clings -
.splitting..........it..........needs..........pick..........axe.........motions.
The sweat running
down my back
reminds me of the rivers
we used to walk by.
The dirt that we will
lay you under
stains my hands
like flour.
lay you under
stains my hands
like flour.
Your death is
under my fingernails.
It hasn’t even
happened yet.
You are inside the house
waiting as always
to move
if food is offered.
You don’twaiting as always
to move
if food is offered.
move so well now;
you shake when you stand
if you stand at all.
I put my shovel down.
I pick up the fork.
© Dave Pickering
From Scratch
I shaved you off like a snake sheds skin.
You passed away, years drifting in feather clumps
and when you had gone I was younger, smoother.
Running my fingers across my face
was like caressing the skin of a lover
discovered as a new country,
a country understood only partially
through maps and high resolution photographs.
You extended me ambiguously,
suggesting ethnicities and religions,
dimensions which I lack and long for.
You will return, pushing your way
through my pores like snowdrops in spring,
clinging to me like limpets and moss on those other faces:
the rocks and cliffs that block the sea from covering us.
But you will come back changed, tidied up like
hedges in suburban gardens, smarting up across my chin,
aging me gently, antiquing me like furniture
so I can be seen as responsible.
You will betray me for your 30 pieces of silver.
© Dave Pickering
You passed away, years drifting in feather clumps
and when you had gone I was younger, smoother.
Running my fingers across my face
was like caressing the skin of a lover
discovered as a new country,
a country understood only partially
through maps and high resolution photographs.
You extended me ambiguously,
suggesting ethnicities and religions,
dimensions which I lack and long for.
You will return, pushing your way
through my pores like snowdrops in spring,
clinging to me like limpets and moss on those other faces:
the rocks and cliffs that block the sea from covering us.
But you will come back changed, tidied up like
hedges in suburban gardens, smarting up across my chin,
aging me gently, antiquing me like furniture
so I can be seen as responsible.
You will betray me for your 30 pieces of silver.
© Dave Pickering
Connection
I sang a song with the bus driver.
We didn’t speak
or look at each other
We fell into a burning ring of fire.
Neither of us had deep enough voices.
© Dave Pickering
We didn’t speak
or look at each other
We fell into a burning ring of fire.
Neither of us had deep enough voices.
© Dave Pickering
Chain
I light another one from the burning tip,
breathe it in, mix it with
the nerves that flip inside me.
Its poisons fill me,
I am free.
I am free.
Its poisons fill me,
the nerves that flip inside me.
Breathe it in, mix it with
another one from the burning tip.
© Dave Pickering
breathe it in, mix it with
the nerves that flip inside me.
Its poisons fill me,
I am free.
I am free.
Its poisons fill me,
the nerves that flip inside me.
Breathe it in, mix it with
another one from the burning tip.
© Dave Pickering
Around
inside the bus there is no sound…
water surrounds but doesn’t wash…
… I should have packed waterproof clothing
… faces stare out at as rushing glass falls
film between bubbles and worlds…
walls that hold away the weather…
… oil forms puddles on the road
… I wish I had a digital camera
and it is rainbows…
bubbling…
melting…
splashing…
and
spitting…
rainbows that are living
…life is water flowing over windows
© Dave Pickering
water surrounds but doesn’t wash…
… I should have packed waterproof clothing
… faces stare out at as rushing glass falls
film between bubbles and worlds…
walls that hold away the weather…
… oil forms puddles on the road
… I wish I had a digital camera
and it is rainbows…
bubbling…
melting…
splashing…
and
spitting…
rainbows that are living
…life is water flowing over windows
© Dave Pickering
Sunday, 11 November 2007
I Painted Him in a Dream Once
Shadows across the backs of his eyes
talk away like the insides of clocks,
making the light highlight the
white of the earthenware pots.
He painted himself into everything,
making wood express emotion
and paint become a mirror.
© Dave Pickering
talk away like the insides of clocks,
making the light highlight the
white of the earthenware pots.
He painted himself into everything,
making wood express emotion
and paint become a mirror.
© Dave Pickering
Inner Bukowski
Shards are shredded;
prickly like whisky.
Parts of me don’t fit anywhere.
Love is something to share but need is lonely.
Ripping stuff up, ripping stuff off,
remembering something clean.
I wish I could get fucked up
by fists or drugs or numbing sex
but none of it fits with
all this getting up
and putting down 5 day weeks.
Responsibility kills the Bukowski in us all
or maybe it creates him.
Formed in bile and boredom,
he squats in your womb,
sharpening a spoon to rip open your belly
to carve out your heart,
ready to eat you up like a kid at a birthday party
stuffing blamanche into his flabby cheeks.
© Dave Pickering
prickly like whisky.
Parts of me don’t fit anywhere.
Love is something to share but need is lonely.
Ripping stuff up, ripping stuff off,
remembering something clean.
I wish I could get fucked up
by fists or drugs or numbing sex
but none of it fits with
all this getting up
and putting down 5 day weeks.
Responsibility kills the Bukowski in us all
or maybe it creates him.
Formed in bile and boredom,
he squats in your womb,
sharpening a spoon to rip open your belly
to carve out your heart,
ready to eat you up like a kid at a birthday party
stuffing blamanche into his flabby cheeks.
© Dave Pickering
Van Gogh’s Trees
Like when we saw those trees that looked like arms,
clawing out of the ground and clutching the leaves,
stopping them from flying away.
When we got close, the woods melted into paint,
dark splodges of intense hunger and thirst
swirling round each other in desire and repulsion.
It was the sea of paint that had anchored the leaves
and stopped them from slipping into heaven,
not soil or mulch or even gravity.
Dark vines slithered from these snakes of paint,
fists holding the legs of birds as they
frantically flapped and squawked upwards.
.
Like that time - you remember it - when the crowds
gathered round to watch the unmoving squares
and they only gave you cream for your tea.
© Dave Pickering
clawing out of the ground and clutching the leaves,
stopping them from flying away.
When we got close, the woods melted into paint,
dark splodges of intense hunger and thirst
swirling round each other in desire and repulsion.
It was the sea of paint that had anchored the leaves
and stopped them from slipping into heaven,
not soil or mulch or even gravity.
Dark vines slithered from these snakes of paint,
fists holding the legs of birds as they
frantically flapped and squawked upwards.
.
Like that time - you remember it - when the crowds
gathered round to watch the unmoving squares
and they only gave you cream for your tea.
© Dave Pickering
Everyday Alchemy
Boiling up these moments,
separating the meat from the bone
and the stock from the loss;
what you have left is all you’ve got.
I package it all up in small tears
that taste like cough drops.
I am here to make the stone more stony:
this is everyday alchemy.
Many interesting metals are bathed in chrome.
Don’t be distracted by the soup; look at the stone.
The elements form a sediment
at the bottom of your soul…
the exact shape of an eyelash
the feel of dry rice in a bowl
… if you move too fast all you’ll have is the past
because the future hasn’t happened and the clay has been cast.
So enjoy the heat of the moment,
let it set, polaroid-flash it and accept you’ll forget.
The afterimage will lie in your mind,
something half formed that you will find
when searching at the back, on the top of the shelves,
covered with dust like everything else.
When you mix it in with some processed thing
from out of a tin, the taste on your plate will mean something…
a line you read in a book or a magazine
the way your finger nail looks before you scrub it clean
a tiny detail mentioned on the news
the way your granddad chews his food
the colour of the morning on a deep autumn day
the gurgling of a shit blocked drain
… Let the alchemy of everyday happen inside your brain;
find the patterns and string the theory,
life is NEVER dull or dreary,
frame your reference properly,
make your relationships relative,
be the particle and the wave,
make alchemy every day.
© Dave Pickering
separating the meat from the bone
and the stock from the loss;
what you have left is all you’ve got.
I package it all up in small tears
that taste like cough drops.
I am here to make the stone more stony:
this is everyday alchemy.
Many interesting metals are bathed in chrome.
Don’t be distracted by the soup; look at the stone.
The elements form a sediment
at the bottom of your soul…
the exact shape of an eyelash
the feel of dry rice in a bowl
… if you move too fast all you’ll have is the past
because the future hasn’t happened and the clay has been cast.
So enjoy the heat of the moment,
let it set, polaroid-flash it and accept you’ll forget.
The afterimage will lie in your mind,
something half formed that you will find
when searching at the back, on the top of the shelves,
covered with dust like everything else.
When you mix it in with some processed thing
from out of a tin, the taste on your plate will mean something…
a line you read in a book or a magazine
the way your finger nail looks before you scrub it clean
a tiny detail mentioned on the news
the way your granddad chews his food
the colour of the morning on a deep autumn day
the gurgling of a shit blocked drain
… Let the alchemy of everyday happen inside your brain;
find the patterns and string the theory,
life is NEVER dull or dreary,
frame your reference properly,
make your relationships relative,
be the particle and the wave,
make alchemy every day.
© Dave Pickering
1000 Pieces
Next to my diary there’s a tin.
Inside it are little things:
jigsaw pieces.
I wrote when nobody knew of me
that people should be sorrowful but always rejoicing.
Now they sell my diary in a shop by a gallery,
my paintings on its walls.
People spend money
on prints and forgeries.
I didn’t make any money
but I stayed alive
until I pulled a gun on myself in a cornfield and died.
Is that why my work survived?
A thousand pieces of a painting I once smeared across a canvass.
It feels heartless to see it disappear
but I love it.
Every person who buys this thing
gets to piece together part of my soul,
fit the shapes into the holes,
take me apart and make me continue.
Children take me out
and fret about the different bits of sky
I made exist before I died.
A thousand pieces make many pictures.
Half finished jigsaws makes new pictures,
speak new truths
and make new paintings for themselves.
They take my words and make new thoughts;
no one will remember their shape
or hang half finished jigsaws on the walls.
You can make as much art as you like from me
but you won’t get it in an art gallery.
No one will read your diary;
you won’t shoot yourself like me.
Someone wrote a song about me,
How you suffered for your sanity. How you tried to set them free.
Don McLean thinks he knows me
but I never existed really.
There were always a thousand pieces of me.
© Dave Pickering
jigsaw pieces.
I wrote when nobody knew of me
that people should be sorrowful but always rejoicing.
Now they sell my diary in a shop by a gallery,
my paintings on its walls.
People spend money
on prints and forgeries.
I didn’t make any money
but I stayed alive
until I pulled a gun on myself in a cornfield and died.
Is that why my work survived?
A thousand pieces of a painting I once smeared across a canvass.
It feels heartless to see it disappear
but I love it.
Every person who buys this thing
gets to piece together part of my soul,
fit the shapes into the holes,
take me apart and make me continue.
Children take me out
and fret about the different bits of sky
I made exist before I died.
A thousand pieces make many pictures.
Half finished jigsaws makes new pictures,
speak new truths
and make new paintings for themselves.
They take my words and make new thoughts;
no one will remember their shape
or hang half finished jigsaws on the walls.
You can make as much art as you like from me
but you won’t get it in an art gallery.
No one will read your diary;
you won’t shoot yourself like me.
Someone wrote a song about me,
How you suffered for your sanity. How you tried to set them free.
Don McLean thinks he knows me
but I never existed really.
There were always a thousand pieces of me.
© Dave Pickering
Sunday, 30 September 2007
tiny
The grey wetness of London
seeps behind my eyes;
silver birches on the street
peel like sunburned skin.
My nipples are hard -
two lumps of grit that
offer no sustenance;
they are empty like half-
remembered memory;
they suggest, but express nothing.
of weathers and times as I bus
myself back to the place where
I exchange time for money.
My needs are unclear and mixed up,
so completely opposite to the simple
contentment of the mother and baby
who I sat with inside yesterday
that dissolves inside the swirls,
suggesting everything, expressing nothing.
I remember this un-understandable love
even though the sun has gone.
© Dave Pickering
seeps behind my eyes;
silver birches on the street
peel like sunburned skin.
My nipples are hard -
two lumps of grit that
offer no sustenance;
they are empty like half-
remembered memory;
they suggest, but express nothing.
Yesterday I drank Arabic tea in a Berlin café,
the sugar sinking slowly and spinning.
I watched the large brown pupils of a baby
light up and heat his mothers face and body
just by being there.
You can’t see or feel this
but it is there.
I feel the contrast of cities,the sugar sinking slowly and spinning.
I watched the large brown pupils of a baby
light up and heat his mothers face and body
just by being there.
You can’t see or feel this
but it is there.
of weathers and times as I bus
myself back to the place where
I exchange time for money.
My needs are unclear and mixed up,
so completely opposite to the simple
contentment of the mother and baby
who I sat with inside yesterday
that dissolves inside the swirls,
suggesting everything, expressing nothing.
When I dressed to go to Germany, I wore layers
not knowing if it would be as cold there as it is here.
I peeled them off one by one until
the sun touched my
skin again.
This morning I am wrapped up as tightly
as tiny fingers gripping an adult thumb.
not knowing if it would be as cold there as it is here.
I peeled them off one by one until
the sun touched my
skin again.
This morning I am wrapped up as tightly
as tiny fingers gripping an adult thumb.
I remember this un-understandable love
even though the sun has gone.
© Dave Pickering
Phases
Her bittersweet lips parted:
maybe it’s something to do
with the phases of the moon.
You get disorientated and confused,
bewildered by inconsistency.
It’s a day that makes insides feel dry,
dust-blown, sanded skin;
you are a bleached bone
and the taste of ice cold ginger beer;
screw your eyes tight.
Another day, another month;
a crescent, a half, a full,
waxing and waning
into sudden smiling.
Thirst quenched, forehead wet,
swilling the bubbles
around in your mouth
till the drink goes flat.
You know the taste but you gulp
like a match cracking sulphur,
evaporate like desert water,
misting upwards even before
you can sink down in the sand.
© Dave Pickering
maybe it’s something to do
with the phases of the moon.
You get disorientated and confused,
bewildered by inconsistency.
It’s a day that makes insides feel dry,
dust-blown, sanded skin;
you are a bleached bone
and the taste of ice cold ginger beer;
screw your eyes tight.
Another day, another month;
a crescent, a half, a full,
waxing and waning
into sudden smiling.
Thirst quenched, forehead wet,
swilling the bubbles
around in your mouth
till the drink goes flat.
You know the taste but you gulp
like a match cracking sulphur,
evaporate like desert water,
misting upwards even before
you can sink down in the sand.
© Dave Pickering
We are Standing Outside
You say your nose is cold
so I put it in my mouth
and suck it like a boiled sweet.
I push it against the soft inside of my cheeks
and pretend it tastes like a sherbet lemon.
It lies against the meat,
a raw lamb chop, warm on the worktop,
wrapped in the metallic blanket of my mouth.
I push it around with my tongue,
blow out, blow in
like bellows pumping.
We are waiting in a line.
© Dave Pickering
so I put it in my mouth
and suck it like a boiled sweet.
I push it against the soft inside of my cheeks
and pretend it tastes like a sherbet lemon.
It lies against the meat,
a raw lamb chop, warm on the worktop,
wrapped in the metallic blanket of my mouth.
I push it around with my tongue,
blow out, blow in
like bellows pumping.
We are waiting in a line.
© Dave Pickering
Saturday, 4 August 2007
Window Shopping In Amsterdam
Windows
line the streets.
The goods
on display.
Like eyes
looking out.
Like eyes
looking in.
Red dusk
falling,
each product
washed with crimson.
They look clean.
Bored stares
catch a man's eye -
sudden flirtation:
“I know she doesn’t want me,
but she wants me.”
The best ones
must be
behind the curtains
with someone else.
The best advertising
denies.
The ultimate supermarket.
Sex and shopping
now a glorious
whole.
Sample the wares.
Tight underwear.
Settle for the blonde
because the other one’s busy.
Smiles.
A certain, kind charity:
“Are you sure you’re old enough?”
Suck n’ Fuck;
Sounds like a happy meal.
Big Mac and fries.
Professionalism behind
her eyes.
No exploitation.
Except the self.
Both using
each
other
(a rationalisation?)
No love.
No emotion.
She is so good,
(practice makes perfect)
yet unfulfilling.
I watch myself
step through the screen.
Hardcore pornography.
Going through the motions.
No touching inside
(except with the penis.)
I’m more naked than her.
She keeps her stocking on.
There’s a mirror.
I watch myself.
Watch myself -
I look away.
Tender, soft.
Warm and wet.
Like the seaside,
fairground in the
distance.
It’s like she’s
doing her
nails.
I did ask her for her name,
asked what her name was,
she gave it me,
probably false,
the ink would run.
Where is she from?
“Haven't you come yet?”
How strange, I’m
used to taking longer.
I'm used to longer being whats wanted.
What’s in it for her?
The money.
I feel obliged to
hurry up.
She doesn’t bother faking.
(thank God).
She lights up.
I dress quickly.
“Take your time.”
Breasts covered with
symmetry and smoke.
She throws the
condom
away.
What
a
waste.
“How was your first time?”
“It wasn’t my first....”
“No, with a prostitute.”
“Fine....No... um... Brilliant!”
I feel obliged to sound
grateful,
I feel empty.
It's like Sunday lunch,
you have to be
grateful:
“No, mum, it doesn’t look burnt.”
"I like lumpy gravy!"
She winks.
I stand, looking back.
Toy doll in
the toystore
who were you
really?
We were just
behind
those curtains.
People
walked
outside;
As if I was just...
trying clothes on in Primark,
queues forming outside.
She didn't fit me.
The Brand Name: Marlene.
Was it real?
Is there anything real here?
Maybe I didn't hear it right,
Eastern European whispers,
accented in the dark.
I wanted to learn
something -
I found nothing.
Nothing but
materialism
mnd emptiness.
Maybe they are
the
same
thing.
An engagement ring inside jacket lining:
a
cold
hard
thing.
I can’t remember
her face
but I know
her
vagina
is
pierced.
© Dave Pickering
Sunday, 8 July 2007
Nose
The cavity of my nose has become
something separate from me,
an endless space like a human soul:
always present but
impossible to fully comprehend.
When it has unblocked itself,
running water like a stupid tap,
I could hoover up the world with it.
It grows roots into my head,
spreading inside my flesh and
clawing at my skull,
aching like teeth crunching ice cubes.
When I press my nose on either side it clicks.
It sounds like a metronome
but also there is a wobble board quality to it.
© Dave Pickering
something separate from me,
an endless space like a human soul:
always present but
impossible to fully comprehend.
When it has unblocked itself,
running water like a stupid tap,
I could hoover up the world with it.
It grows roots into my head,
spreading inside my flesh and
clawing at my skull,
aching like teeth crunching ice cubes.
When I press my nose on either side it clicks.
It sounds like a metronome
but also there is a wobble board quality to it.
© Dave Pickering
Sunday, 22 April 2007
Dusk
Dusk is when the sky kisses the horizon.
Fading, a wash, a shading,
like squinting,
paint running on a page and mixing.
The soft sound of the word.
Day coming up, night coming down.
The soft sound of the word;
the slow, slinking, silky sssss -
the flick, the click of the K.
The end of the day
But you can still see the back of its head.
Watching the maroon, the indigo of it all,
the caress of two lovers in
the reflection of a pool’s surface.
At the bottom the silt mixes: murky waters,
thick like wartime cocoa,
knobs of butter at the top:
floating yellow sun, rainbow oil slick.
The grey weeds, shivering from the gentle rocking
are disturbed by sticklebacks sieving through.
Gravy bubbling, this thickening, thickening.
Dusk is when the horizon kisses the sky.
The soil meets the air and floats on it.
The dark meets the light and muddies it.
It melts between it, fluffs up the pillows.
You are between time:
a moment’s release.
© Dave Pickering
Fading, a wash, a shading,
like squinting,
paint running on a page and mixing.
The soft sound of the word.
Day coming up, night coming down.
The soft sound of the word;
the slow, slinking, silky sssss -
the flick, the click of the K.
The end of the day
But you can still see the back of its head.
Watching the maroon, the indigo of it all,
the caress of two lovers in
the reflection of a pool’s surface.
At the bottom the silt mixes: murky waters,
thick like wartime cocoa,
knobs of butter at the top:
floating yellow sun, rainbow oil slick.
The grey weeds, shivering from the gentle rocking
are disturbed by sticklebacks sieving through.
Gravy bubbling, this thickening, thickening.
Dusk is when the horizon kisses the sky.
The soil meets the air and floats on it.
The dark meets the light and muddies it.
It melts between it, fluffs up the pillows.
You are between time:
a moment’s release.
© Dave Pickering
Beard
It hurts sometimes, the hairs springing from my skin like
the shoots of snowdrops forcing themselves through the frost.
I sieve through them, searching for the thick ones,
take them carefully between my index finger and thumb.
Pinching so tightly, my nails make cuts: broken lines, white half-moons.
The pain is so familiar that I don’t feel it until the task is over.
I snap them out; small saplets of skin like tears are torn,
the end of each scrunched hair is a bead of amber setting a fossil in place.
Pubic and dark, kinky and broken, I rub their roughness against my cheek,
comforting and uncomfortable like spiders’ feet, crawling, fading, moving.
I flick them onto the floor; they sink softly like stray feathers
thrown away to be sucked up at some other time.
Entombed inside hoover bags, the traces of my growth,
the rungs of my tree, these thickets that sprung from me.
© Dave Pickering
the shoots of snowdrops forcing themselves through the frost.
I sieve through them, searching for the thick ones,
take them carefully between my index finger and thumb.
Pinching so tightly, my nails make cuts: broken lines, white half-moons.
The pain is so familiar that I don’t feel it until the task is over.
I snap them out; small saplets of skin like tears are torn,
the end of each scrunched hair is a bead of amber setting a fossil in place.
Pubic and dark, kinky and broken, I rub their roughness against my cheek,
comforting and uncomfortable like spiders’ feet, crawling, fading, moving.
I flick them onto the floor; they sink softly like stray feathers
thrown away to be sucked up at some other time.
Entombed inside hoover bags, the traces of my growth,
the rungs of my tree, these thickets that sprung from me.
© Dave Pickering
Thursday, 22 March 2007
Dance
Bone into matter,
muscle to bone.
Cracking and straining
but never go home.
Movement is draining:
brisk forward roles,
spinning the body
like plates on poles.
Sweat burned shirts,
rough forehead rain,
an exercise-ism,
a blow to the brain.
Release the control,
control the heat,
makeshift the circle,
move dancing feet.
Painting by numbers,
puppets and blinds,
reading the breathbeat,
forgetting the signs.
Bone into matter,
muscle to bone.
No thought to complain with.
Never go home.
© Dave Pickering
To hear Dance performed by The Middle Class Bastards click here
muscle to bone.
Cracking and straining
but never go home.
Movement is draining:
brisk forward roles,
spinning the body
like plates on poles.
Sweat burned shirts,
rough forehead rain,
an exercise-ism,
a blow to the brain.
Release the control,
control the heat,
makeshift the circle,
move dancing feet.
Painting by numbers,
puppets and blinds,
reading the breathbeat,
forgetting the signs.
Bone into matter,
muscle to bone.
No thought to complain with.
Never go home.
© Dave Pickering
To hear Dance performed by The Middle Class Bastards click here
Friday, 16 March 2007
I was the window and you were the night
From Substance
You entered me like moonlight through a window -
filling my blood with pale blue light.
You crystallised on my skin, frost on glass -
forming prisms on my sight.
The black cat, sleek and wild, was purring against my feet,
as innocent as a child, I suddenly felt complete.
But for every crisp clear night
there comes a pale dawn,
For every human happy
a million miseries are born,
So away I walk from you -
though your midnight has not died,
And because I once allowed it in
your night burns my insides.
© Dave Pickering
You entered me like moonlight through a window -
filling my blood with pale blue light.
You crystallised on my skin, frost on glass -
forming prisms on my sight.
The black cat, sleek and wild, was purring against my feet,
as innocent as a child, I suddenly felt complete.
But for every crisp clear night
there comes a pale dawn,
For every human happy
a million miseries are born,
So away I walk from you -
though your midnight has not died,
And because I once allowed it in
your night burns my insides.
© Dave Pickering
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