Songs of Sordid Sobriety

Sober stutters of a shy barman

At the Crosse Keys,

Stammer through this tipsy think-tank

At Bank.

Experts providing unsolicited advice and ideas

Whilst she sips on draught lager,

Stella Artois,

In a macabre

Mouse infested

Microwave molested

Place.

Battered Plaice –

A displaced dish

Stained with ‘Jack Daniel's Tennessee Honey Glaze.’

Delays

On a Monday

At Bank.

City people with briefcases

Pretending to discuss politics

Or conflicts

In countries crazed on cocaine.

A blighted brain;

Strain

From success

In a deplorable

Space of sweat –

Sitting upon the brows of

Bankers;

‘City wankers’.

Mayonnaise daubed hands

Shake over blanched potatoes –

Prepared to ‘perfection’ –

An irrational societal expectation

Of a chip -

Fried in fat,

Drowned in vinegar,

Laced in salt –

An assault

Against the archetype

Approved by the drunk -

The dregs;

The remnants of real life.

The strife

For sobriety.

 

Sauntering down the ‘silk road’

At Bobo and Wild -

Dukkka spiced poached eggs

Saturate the legs

Of lamb

Slow-cooked for 12 hours.

Sliced chorizo

And smoked bacon

Are eaten

Before a Kraken

Comes in the nebulous night.

An          elusive    sight

Strangled by ‘Creamy Pepperoni Sauce’.

Her belligerent burger

Battles Budweiser

At dawn.

British beef pastrami

At noon –

A time when the soul relinquishes the moon

And accepts the sobriety of Sunday in June.

Last night’s tune

Is now weaved into the rainbow laced loom –

Whilst the search for lost love in Cameroon

Commences.

A debut novel

Read over a roasted falafel

And a sad syrup-saturated Belgium waffle

At brunch

In Bank.

The more she drank.

The further she sank.

In Bank;

A city waiting in suspense

To create the pretence

Of prosperity

Again    

And        again.