Gaia Holmes
Sweet nothing
"How much d'ya charge luv?"
Lust and spittle spray my face.
Spice clouds simmer
over the roof tops.
Turmeric burns my lips.
I walk with my head down
eyes locked away from the crawling cars
and their letching engine breath,
their thin techno heart-beats.
I pass the landmarks:
harems of washing line silks,
the burnt-out Metro,
the pillaged church
with blackened guts,
and the remnants of Christ's heart
clinging to soft window lead.
"Would you take it from behind, luv?"
Pizza Express, Mr. Chips, The Shalimar,
oregano, garam Masala,
fish, fear, garlic and desire.
They cluster on curb corners
suck hard on Marlboro.
Fingers kiss fingers,
pass over packets
of Ecstasy, speed,
Moroccan black and cut-price paranoia.
A fugue of evangelical clapping
and the 'call to prayer'
tangles over Hopwood Lane,
"Slapper, Scrubber, Slag, Dog, Bitch."
Closer to the core the colour
bleeds into the tar and roar
of the flyover,
then it's grey
with the precinct and the clockwork pigeons,
the smudged print of the 'Evening Courier'
and the vendor's faces
streaked with inky warpaint
where they've rubbed the words in,
and the slow chip-shop-queues,
air slick with beef dripping,
tangy with vinegar and stilettos
and the non-stop karaoke bar
by the zebra crossing
where Stand by your man
guides you across the stripes.
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