The garnish gallivanted
around the kitchen and fell
into the lap of a dish.
Smitten, he swore
to be her protector;
to love her
and hold her
forever –

and he did
as they copulated
in the acidic belly
of a diner.

Someone trawled a rake through the sky
to make paddy fields of clouds
a full season’s worth of corn it seemed
the sudden sheaves heavy and weighted down
low in the sky-
then, as if the farmer decided
the crops were ready
the harvest was nigh,
scythed them
and drenched me in breakfast.

I received an Apple Watch
as a Christmas gift
from my husband.
It was
trickery.

For
he asked
me to pick
yellow or rose gold
and I smiled, thinking: Jewellery.

A lollipop tree
with an antenna
in a deserted wasteland
of cement,
radioing for help.

If heaven is above us
and hell below, then this
is the closest
I’ll get to heaven,
and the fastest
way to hell.

The cactus glared back with
one bloodshot eye but,
even with two walking sticks,
it could not get away.

Each flame’s an entreaty,
a fiery bud planted by many an earnest devotee –
that the Sleeping Buddha may in
divine mercy let his overflowing
empathy wash over humanity. And
whenever a tiny light flickers out,
somewhere else a plea is answered, a
dream flowers, and a wish bears fruit.

The years, the years tree spend,
trying to reach the other side.
And we drive under, oblivious,
to the overarching botanical effort
of picturesque roads.

A precise pencil
is a happy thing.
Being blunt
is never the policy
of diplomatic stationery.