Me and Mum in Mexico after far too much tequila ...

     Anyway folks, here's three poems from a long time ago ...

                  * * * * * * * * * * *


  'On Reading A Poem by William Carlos Williams'

    It is titled 'The Painting'
    and begins with a line
    containing the word
    'black'
    which made me think
    of charcoal

    which led to the drawings
    composed by students
    when I used to model
    at an art school

    and then the poem
    goes on to speak
    of 'a delicate lock
    of blond hair'
 
    and I picture
    the fair-haired girl
    who I never spoke to
    but whose shy smile
    open and inviting
    haunts me now,
  
    and I wonder
    how it might have been,
    our friendship

    * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

   'Pregnant Lady in the Laundromat'

   Draped inside a diaphonous
   and billowing
   angel-white sari,
   its red border
   trailing over your delicate
   sandelled feet.

   Eyes downcast
   or gazing everywhere
   but where
   others are.

   Intently passing time
   by reading 'Rental Homes'
   then placing it in front of
   your blooming belly
   as a barrier,
   hiding from view
   the growing little one
   inside you.

   I guess it is
   so very personal
   isn't it.

   You were so aware of yourself,
   shy and a little afraid,
   like a nervous animal
   at a water-hole.

   * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

   'Bourbon'
 
   I am discovering that it is the hardest thing
   to stop myself going downstairs
   to the liquor store
   for a bottle
   of Bourbon,

   it seems to call and my whole body
   seems to be craving
   some release,
   and my mind
   and my eyes
   hurt real bad.   

   * * * * * * * * * * * *
   Stillman Street, San Francisco, very early nineties.