Patsy's Life

Patsy

Patsy thinks of sex, but without faces;

he often thinks this way

because there never was a welcoming face,

so he's never had sex,

and this July he'll be 46.

Patsy lives alone, and is settled in his ways;

people think him strange,

never ask him to join them in the pub

or wherever;

‘he’s getting more peculiar’, they say.

Patsy has an office job;

colleagues bid him good morning at coffee-break

but sit at another table.

He eats his lunch in the Arms bar,

and always sits facing a wall.

February sunshine silvers bare branches.

She, sitting at her kitchen table,

turns her hands upward to run her eyes

down the insides of her arms,

to see how the water will drain

when the clouds burst.

She lights a cigarette,

then sits in the snake-pit

listening to the slitherings around her,

till deafened, she flails at them

so they become smoke.

February; heavy drops knock on her window

and she, conscious of  the thinness of  glass,

of the thousand mile spate that's around her,

crosses to the hob to make tea,

to forget  branches. 

Hughie

Hughie thinks of sex without faces;

he often thinks this way

because there never was a welcoming face,

so he never had sex,

and this July he'll be 46.

Hughie lives alone and is settled in his ways;

people think him peculiar,

never ask him to join them in the pub

or wherever.

He is growing more peculiar, they say.

Hughie has an office job;

colleagues bid him good morning at coffee-break

but sit at a different table.

He eats his lunch in the Arms bar,

and always sits facing  the wall.