‘Twas the night before Christmas in the small provincial town, soulless and starless with a dank reputation for brawls, bare bottoms and bakeries.
Not a creature was stirring except Jack the monstrous crow-black cat perched high on La Cuff Hill with a dead mouse in his mouth and small bell under his chin, for good measure. And Mr and Mrs Plum the loneliest of lonely who sit in their car on the very same hill and wait and wait with stirring anticipation for no-name lovers to bring them a small glimpse of windy pleasure. To this end, Mrs Plum hangs her stockings from the rear view mirror.
...
When Granma Mo breathed out her last
With the sun in west descent
My dad he phoned old Prendergast
‘Cause he discounts ten percent.
...
Homesick at all for any Thing, I stand waiting,
carved by despairing commuters to their mould.
I live within my own time but if I lived within someone else's
would they be okay with it?
...
Under my leather I soak with heat
Wearing no helmet or straps on my feet
As bare as a slave, I run Aquila to the fort
Then panting, huddled, fall quiet to the chalk.
...
The Haquarious Twoo is a most wondrous beast
Who loves nothing more than an aqueous feast
In willow pattern dishes made entirely of lint
Laid out on a table of nose-crafted flint.
...
Cuda, mother goddess, in everything we know;
Hallowed is your simplicity, cult of measure and painted justice.
You are the damp currant soil between toes, stars of birthstone blue dust,
The razed warrior sun, mercury flooding moon,
...
Cuda, ācennicge gyden tō ælcuht ðe ic oncnāwan,
Ġehālgod ēower ānfealdnes, hād orgilde metan and salwedre efennes;
Þu bist duguð fūht smītan betwēonum tanede, heofoncandel byrdstā h¯æwen æscegeswāp,
Ðone yppinge burgwígend heaðusigel and mōna begīetende,
...
Some people will always be narcissists,
Bothered not with their sisters or brothers.
To their simple minds they are the majesty
And the world bows to them for one thing or another.
...