Pakefield Pirates

The pirate flag 

Beckons
Calls me over
Invites me to walk on in to an old railway carriage
and help myself to coffee and cakes
Served in beer kegs and arranged in treasure chest baskets
I hurry on up the lane, to the corner plot
A station sign offers up to the visitor
Pakefield
Welcoming strangers, pulling them through the crossing gates and into a garden of cottage flowers
A signal tries to warn me
I offer up my thirsty smile
A place to sit a while and compose a poem
Two pairs of aged and fearsome eyes frown me down
A caravan
A mock-up
An ancient couple enjoying tea together in a summer-house bowl.
A taunt.
 
 
 

The Pakefield Ladies

 

 

Hunched-up ladies huddle by the sea

 

Shivering, wrapped up in the sun.

 

Tied up in coarse rope.

 

Anchored to the pebbled beach.

 

Unable to even shuffle.

 

Howling unintelligible tones.

 

Gagged.

 

And blinded.

 

Path markers.

 

All routes out long

 

gone.
 
 
Copyright owned by Jay Cool

 

Pakefield Sea Front

 

 

 

Waves.

 

Waves walking towards me as

 

I sit drinking tea at a pub by the sea

 

Thinking about fish running beneath the surface of the

 

Milky swirl of the tea as I swish my teaspoon around

 

Making whirlpools

 

Kites ripple and twirl around in the sea

 

Sailing boats fly overhead wrapped up

 

In seaweed

 

And wind turbines grow like regal flowers

 

Up through the gaps between the wooden planks

 

Of the table soaked in an ocean of tea

 

Feeding on the scatterings of brown cappuccino sugar

 

Left behind by a bleating sheep

 

Who abandoned pub-garden confinement

 

To bite and grind chunks of reinforced concrete

 

From the gravestones

 

Of recent arrivals.
 
Copyright owned by Jay Cool

 

 

 

 

 


 

 

House Thieves in a Fruit Bowl

Apples,

Bananas,
Grapes,
Oranges
And pears
House thieves in a fruit bowl.
Imagine instead …
A mouldy green tennis ball,
A plastic crescent yellow moon,
A tonne of purple pom-poms,
A squidgy-orange stress ball,
And a well-fed Martian with his bald head sinking into his torso and sacks of flesh flowing
over his tiny teetering toes.
Natural inhabitants.
 
 
Copyright owned by Jay Cool


Photo: A Max Pixel ‘Creative Commons’ image, labelled free for reuse.

Golden Eggs

 

white eggs

 

Eggs sizzling in the rivers of fat from the bacon, sausages and black pudding of others

 

As they pile on the pounds that threaten to consume them, to suck them into their own

 

 vortex, their own centre of gravity, the iris of the self.

 

A black dot contracting and expanding.

 

Pulsating.

 

Gasping

 

Hanging on

 

At nine AM

 

for its last breath

 

until

 

it swims away like a black tadpole

 

in a downfall of freshly squeezed orange juice

 

diluted by creamy warm coffee

 

stalked by hot scalding tea

 

bumped along and shifted into

 

a soft yolky sandpit landing …

 

Gold.

 

 

Copyright owned by Jay Cool

The Photo is from Max Pixel and is labelled as a Creative Commons image, free for reuse.

 

Facebook Reunion

2cv

Re-emergence of old friends.
Ancient connections.
Whispered notes in tutorials.
Student cars.
Minis, 2CVs and Morris Minors.
Starving, suicidal acquaintances raced into surgeries, collapsing into the future.
In journeys long gone.
And misremembered.
False recollections.
Old cells died and replaced.
Recharged.
 
 
Copyright owned by Jay Cool


Image: Photo of 2CV from PXhere, a Creative Commons image, labelled ‘free for reuse’.

Ribs

 

 

Spare change?

 

Eyes fixated on an imaginary point ahead, the host moved on.

 

Ignored him.

 

Thought about her guests.

 

How to prepare for their visit.

 

 

Barbaric.

 

He thought.

 

She couldn’t even look him in the eye.

 

Couldn’t see the juice, the tears, the potential

 

 

He saw.

 

In the fat around her waist.

 

The opportunity.

 

An invitation.

 

Flavoured, succulent.

 

Perhaps with some added spice.

 

She was oozing with it.

 

Full of it.

 

Full of herself.

 

 

Ribs please?

 

Preferably pork.

 

Not keen on the beef, thanks.

 

House-warming. And.

 

It’s too wet for a barbecue today.

 

Pre-cooked?

 

Even better.

 

Haven’t got time to roast them.

 

Not in my oven.

 

The kitchen’s being decorated, you see.

 

Waiting for the new tiles.

 

Bit of a mess.

 

Really.

 

 

The guest.

 

Observed the steel tray.

 

The tin foil lining.

 

The bones, with dark bloodied centres.

 

Meat burnt to a crisp.

 

Source?

 

Unidentifiable.

 

Human?

 

Cow?

 

Pig?

 

Dog?

 

 

And helped herself to a slice.

 

Of pizza.

 

Trying not to think about.

 

The ribs being prised apart.

 

Splayed out.

 

Fanned out.

 

Roasted.

 

And consumed.

 

 

More pizza?

 

Yes please.

 

 

There didn’t need to be any waste.

 

The dogs would chew on the bones.

 

Nothing would be left.

 

 

Spare ribs?

 

No.

 

 

Spare change?

 

No.

 

 

Another female.

 

Walked on past.

 

Ignored him.

 

 

Was this life?

 

All this.

 

From a single leftover rib?

 

Better to devour.

 

It.
 
 
Copyright owned by Jay Cool


Source: The ‘ribs’ photograph is a creative commons image  from Pixabay

 

A Walk in the Grounds of Cornwallis Arms

Cracked white paint on a traffic pylon, parading as Queen Elizabeth’s cement filled pock marked face.

 

Black paint speckled with green mould and a leafless twig coiled around it, like a dead arm clinging to an iron bed-post.

 

A black shiny duck’s head with freckles of bottle green, like a snooker ball wearing my long-since buried hand-knitted school cardigan.

 

Green frazzled branches sprouting out of a once, hairless chest. Does this happen to the bodies of dead men buried in recyclable coffins?
 
 

Copyright owned by Jay Cool

Image of ‘Mallard’ by Bert de Tilly, licensed for reuse via Creative Commons.

 

Lament of the Cheerio

 

 

 

Watch me drop on the

floor.




Go on, carry on just sitting

there – looking at me.

 

I suppose you’ll tread on me

 

later and not even notice

 

my saturated remains being subjected to further torture when squished

 

into the carpet by your husband’s heel.

 

 

I’m covered in dribbles of saliva.

 

Your daughter spat me … out.

 

Discarded me.

 

Said I was soggy with old milk.

 

Nothing I can do

 

about the deafening

 

CRUNCH

 

as she snaps up a fresher fancy.

 

 

Don’t waste your time

 

Analysing the ‘contents’ on my … throwaway home.

 

Go on.

 

Stick it in the blue bin.

 

 

You don’t care about me.

 

You said ‘Cheerio’ to my mates and sucked them up your enormous vacuum cleaner and left me

 

here

 

no longer sodden

 

but disparate

 

dried up

 

in p i e  c    e          s.
 
Copyright owned by Jay Cool



Source: Image of ‘Cheerio on a Journey’ is available as a Creative Commons image licensed for reuse, by the photographer Sam Bald.

 

Fear

 

 

 

 




A large modern house with dormer windows protruding from an expansive roof, peering over tall brick walls designed to put off the nosy.

 

A coughing, spluttering heavy goods vehicle hurtling towards me.

 

A ‘For Sale’ sign attached to the front garden post of the ‘mansion’.

 

A tightly wrinkled brown hand tapping on the low brick wall of my handkerchief sized front garden.

 

A mature tree, always there, over the road, now shedding orange leaves, shaking them over the tall brick wall, into the path of oncoming lorries.

 

The gateless entrance to my front garden.

 

The smokeless chimney pot over the road, letting go of nothing.

 

A busy road, a small child.

 

Fear.


Copyright owned by Jay Cool

Source: Photo of ‘Heavy Traffic’ taken by N Chadwick and available by Creative Commons License on Geograph.org.uk