Theme Waitress
I was the Lorelei of our school swimming club
- seems tonight I have become her again
wound up in seashells and sequins
part time waitress in a seafood restaurant
taking tips from men and their wives
they all point
their fingers at the holes in my black stockings
The guy with his back to me
on the phone to the midwife
recalls my Queen of Sheba
the night I was bound up in fate and gold plate
he suggested slipping the leash
leaving his wife and this dust bowl
All for me
The cowboys all wink at me
tell me tonight like any other night
I have something with my whelks and cockles
I can’t imagine what
whilst I am serving scampi meals and sarsaparillas
in my stiletto heels
I long to jump in a taxi
take a bus ride out of here
but I am a realist
I can’t survive on thin air
so I carry on serving, taking tips
from men and their wives
Page(s) 34
magazine list
- Features
- zines
- 10th Muse
- 14
- Acumen
- Agenda
- Ambit
- Angel Exhaust
- ARTEMISpoetry
- Atlas
- Blithe Spirit
- Borderlines
- Brando's hat
- Brittle Star
- Candelabrum
- Cannon's Mouth, The
- Chroma
- Coffee House, The
- Dream Catcher
- Equinox
- Erbacce
- Fabric
- Fire
- Floating Bear, The
- French Literary Review, The
- Frogmore Papers, The
- Global Tapestry
- Grosseteste Review
- Homeless Diamonds
- Interpreter's House, The
- Iota
- Journal, The
- Lamport Court
- London Magazine, The
- Magma
- Matchbox
- Matter
- Modern Poetry in Translation
- Monkey Kettle
- Moodswing
- Neon Highway
- New Welsh Review
- North, The
- Oasis
- Obsessed with pipework
- Orbis
- Oxford Poetry
- Painted, spoken
- Paper, The
- Pen Pusher Magazine
- Poetry Cornwall
- Poetry London
- Poetry London (1951)
- Poetry Nation
- Poetry Review, The
- Poetry Salzburg Review
- Poetry Scotland
- Poetry Wales
- Private Tutor
- Purple Patch
- Quarto
- Rain Dog
- Reach Poetry
- Review, The
- Rialto, The
- Second Aeon
- Seventh Quarry, The
- Shearsman
- Smiths Knoll
- Smoke
- South
- Staple
- Strange Faeces
- Tabla Book of New Verse, The
- Thumbscrew
- Tolling Elves
- Ugly Tree, The
- Weyfarers
- Wolf, The
- Yellow Crane, The