Vanilla Wine


Above discoloured seas,
the potters and the painters are at work
in furbished gun-emplacements.

*

My uvula’s been mangled,
my gums adroitly darned
with bristly twine:

the periodontists call it
a full clearance.

*

Could this be a new beginning,
an end to thoughts
of waning and stagnation,

of gulls, decrepit junks
and orange suns?

*

HAPPY CHIMPS ARE PROBLEM-SOLVERS!

My flat becomes a speech laboratory:
‘*?$!%!&_ . . .’

*

The shunted clouds pile up
in livid scoops,
podgy helpings garishly backlit.

I cleave to the delights
of custard and marshmallow
and dunked biscuit.