Jackson

I want a better pen. This one came from a chainstore packet dozen. Its cheap opaque plastic hides its ink and its barrel is too narrow for my hand. Its medium point is sadly blunt. It’s rough, sluggish, dragging its ball: it doesn’t dance. I want a well-built fine-point, grip-milled, translucent. I have a particular… Read more

In the glass-shielded propaganda frame mounted on the bulkhead of the driver’s compartment a carefully-chosen chubby bloke-next-door is white     in a uniform     straight     smile I can almost smell his cheap aftershave Someone else has risked the cameras to rim his welcoming teeth with crimsonned lips First published in Uneven Floor Read more

He starts at seven with the others, warming up in the cool shade before the sun surmounts the trees, radio chattering, playing songs he knows. He begins a new line. The mortar, right mix of cement and sand, lies heaped like mousse on the board. Lifted, distributed, lifted, distributed, then levelled with one long light… Read more

an owl on brown bark its eyes black zeroes its face a white heart it gathers the light of the stars if you are a mouse it is thinking of you From a painting by wildlife artist Jeremy Paul Read more

I say about leaves nothing I’m thousands hanging in one, composting on of millions, wet, eaten, churned to mush, a leaf of billions, trillions the sunshine First published in Uneven Floor Read more

The hanging fronds of my tree swing with the wind When it blows a lot they move a lot They thrash, slap, whip, yank at themselves When it blows a little they move a little, back and forth between the pull of the air and the hold of the tensile trunk In the odd hour… Read more