Walk on Air

Poems 2011-218

William Hatchett


































Contents

1
 Contents

Walk on air against your better judgement 3
A change of career 4
Please donate generously 5
It's not right 6
Nostalgia 7
Snow drops 8
Building a canoe 8
The rubbish dragon 9
The functions of suburbia 9
Footsteps and shadows 10
Philip’s room 11
Winter villanelle 12
Heatwave 13
Ye Tudor tower blocke 14
Come dine with me 15
I am not a cannibal 16
Philip Larkin is on Top of the Pops 17
Leaving home 18
Outsider 19
Jazz pigeons 19
The Stranger 20
The sweet spot 20
Sullen Sid 21
Pavement trapeze with Special Brew 21
British tear gas 22
Riot at Ford Open Prison 23
The word mines 24

2
 Walk on air against your better judgement

Somewhere by a tousled strip of sea

troubled gulls fly busily.
In a curdled town trading on past glories
a new life is waiting for me.

Beach combers and fishermen

will form my community.
They could almost be on holiday.
They have moved to the edge, untied the knot
exchanged their old place for a smaller plot.
There’s no shame in living in a caravan.

Man’s lot is to travel hopefully.

Not all of them are lonely, or sad.
I will trade down my anxiety
for tranquillity – lucky old granddad.

I’ll be a tethered nomad

where the elements are broken down
gathering samphire and sea lavender
on the edge of some faded town.
The sea my friend, the sky my starry bed
granddad is living in a shed.

3
 A change of career

A change of career, at my age, but what?

Perhaps I could be a philologist
Or work overseas as a diplomat
Or entertain, as a stage hypnotist

In my new role perhaps I could be

A logician, or an ontologist
Or a lecturer in theology
Or a Jungian psychoanalyst

But I am not qualified for that

Or to skateboard professionally
Or to be a comedian, or an acrobat
For I lack the skill or dexterity

Perhaps a gift for mere fluency

Could serve me in my new career
I could be a spin doctor, or a disc jockey
Or the new presenter on Top Gear

I guess you should know that I am not

Strong enough to work in security –
If hot air built homes, I could build a lot –
And that early mornings wouldn’t suit me

A change of career, but what?

Proof-reader, cat breeder, exorcist?
I need a job that is frankly bullshit –
Like style consultant or astrologist

I could spin a line as a touchline hack

A self-styled ‘sports psychologist’
Or turn a coin, half-guru, half-quack
With Feng Shui, as a New Age therapist

If I was fired up with passion

I could demonstrate kitchen gadgetry
Or be a faith healer or work in fashion
But, to be honest, I don’t have the energy

To earn a crust from guile or flattery

My motivation levels are low
Why can’t they just pay me to watch TV?
Each rejection would be a body blow

4
 Please donate generously

Somewhere in our country tonight

a blank face from a mirror stares back

a lonely tormentor turns off the light

at night, there is no-one to attack

daytime is their prime territory.

It’s true that they could victimise the cat

but since animals do not cry

where is the satisfaction in that?

When they are tucked up in bed

they have little opportunity

to oppress those who are merely talented

with their terrifying banality.

To obfuscate, browbeat and confuse

to knot the stomachs of their prey

and render them horribly depressed.

They need you. So give to a bully today!

5
 It's not right

For AJ and Gianni

Why is the sky brown?

Why does trees grow down?
Why do snails bite?
Why do all babies
Love to fight?
Some things are not right.

Why do worms taste nice?

Why do cats like mice?
Why are clouds so strong?
Why do elephants sing
Such beautiful songs?
Some things are just wrong.

Why do squirrels glow?

Why do snakes like snow?
Why do horses moo?
And why is the grass
In the park so blue?
I don't know. Do you?

Why do sweets grow on trees?

Why do rabbits like cheese?
Why are clowns always sad
And why does chocolate
Taste so bad?
Some things are just mad.

6
 Nostalgia

Found in the attic, a cracked old stein

With love to dad a present from the Rhine
It was the last trip you were allowed on
During your youthful rebellion
It is the prerogative of youth to rage
I did. I was a hippy at that age
How I laughed at my parents' tacky crap
There were musicals before there was rap
Radio 2, Semprini Serenade
David Jacobs and his ‘hit parade’

Now my stuff has the same effect on you

The Groundhogs, Focus, Led Zeppelin II
Rebellions are based on hair and beats
And trouser widths but history repeats
In Camden, thin young men in photo shoots
Are wearing skinny jeans and desert boots
From each generation comes barbarous rhyme
From skiffle to rock to hip-hop then to grime

We offend our children, they will theirs

By being boring, or nerds, or ‘squares’
We urge upon the young our own decorum
‘Do not go out like that,’ we implore them
We leave our past, but then it comes back
Nostalgia is in, grey is the new black
Perhaps fashion is merely a sense of smell
For what is lasting, what ephemeral

My old army great coat lingers in the hall

Like a relic on a market stall
Mildewed and redolent of old rope
Patchouli oil, Golden Virginia and dope
I wore it at Reading, damp and high
On something. Lasers flashed across the sky
I would not wear it now, it would look weird
Like a pony tail, or a goatee beard
Offences against taste make us sick
Knowing when to stop, that's the trick

7
 Snow drops

Close to Bosworth field, I finally arrive

woodlands, a muddy farm track, a gate.
At the village of Croxall a lowering sky
broods over the manorial estate.
The church beckons me. Am I going home?
Faded and creased like an old diagram
England is written in its soft grey stone.
Perhaps it will tell me who I am.
I seek meaning trying to disinter the dead
from the old graves, where the past is frozen.
Nothing. Sometimes the past cannot be read.
Snowdrops smother them – a white explosion.
I seek consolation from their beauty.
The ancient village is lost, so am I.

Building a canoe

You were a master of wood and glue.

I would watch you carefully as a kid.
I think of you now, building my canoe.
Show me please, dad. You never did.
Your square tipped hands were made to till
to plane and smooth to a fine shine.
I was baffled by your patient skill –
each perfect right-angle and straight line.
For years I watched. You never understood
people, for they lacked symmetry.
They could not be measured and cut, like wood.
I was subdued by your quiet mastery.
I am seeding my boat's imperfection.
I know that it would fail your inspection.

8
 The rubbish dragon

In those days, climbing into the loft

I rose vengefully to do battle.
I was up that ladder like a monkey.
To the rubbish dragon I was Parsifal.
I smote him but he never went away.
Like coral in a subterranean sea
each day he grew, glowing faintly.
The beast was feeding on my energy!
Eventually, the cunning creature won
a final and overwhelming victory
like the Panzers in the Ardennes.
His cloak of darkness folded over me
and I fell victim to his necromancy
in the final conquest of gravity.

The functions of suburbia

They marked their boundaries

with privet and Leylandii
they strimmed and mowed regularly –
nothing happened for centuries.
Decades passed them by
in the comparison of flower beds.
Jealously, they tamed the wild wood
with each trimmed lawn and neat rockery.
Careful not to be too friendly
they observed with furrowed brows
the ambition of neighbours’ sheds
the rows of imprisoned begonias.
The function of suburbia
to push back its silent terror.

9
 Footsteps and shadows

It was built where the Great North Wood

lapped against London – rus in urbe.
Dairies, market gardens and clay pits
farms and then houses, a suburb.

The railway arrived – brick villas

clustered thickly around the station.
Goodbye to the telegraph and horse
Victoria dies – a coronation.

They started our house and finished it.

War came. Light fell across the wall.
Millions were born. Another war.
Footsteps and shadows. Voices in the hall.

Radar, the bomb, nuclear technology.

We breached sound but not light.
Daily, the sun flickered across the wall
marking the passage of day and night.

All those years, no-one noticed

stars or geology; soft words were spoken.
Voices in the hallway rose and fell.
They will do until our light is broken.

10
 Philip’s room

For you, it was always the lonely interior.

At nine o’clock the curtains would be drawn
on the starched damask and flock wallpaper.

Note the imprisoned begonias and the neat lawn

a study in sepia, some Highland scene –
antlers and crepuscular melancholy.

Everything here is cream or mushroom brown.

Nature is subdued by suburban irony.
Such houses have been lost to history.

Old sheet music curls on the piano stand.

If only the wild notes of some New Orleans band
could impose upon this Victorian gentility.

Through an open doorway I can picture you:

the tea-rings, the ash-burned coverlet
the stacked discs, your well-thumbed library.

That was Philip’s room. I can imagine

your history – faded and nicotine yellow
the dog-eared porn, Palgrave’s Golden Treasury.

11
 Winter villanelle for Sarah

Today's a day for being in

It's supposed to be a holiday
To do nothing is not a sin

Like a feral pigeon's wing

The sky's a million shades of grey
Today's a day for being in

Some rotter has stolen my zing

The swine's taken my energy
To do nothing is not a sin

On these occasions, the best thing

Is an absorbing radio play
Today's a day for being in

Scrunched-up paper misses the bin

Even though it's four feet away
To do nothing is not a sin

Well, that's my opinion

It justifies my lethargy
Today's a day for being in
To do nothing is not a sin

12
 Heatwave

Twenty: a walk in the park

The touch of fresh, white linen
Scent of magnolias in the dark
Olive faces of Greek women
I trail my fingers in a fountain
The cicadas are singing
Pines clothe the cool mountain

Thirty: tomatoes fail to thrive

I have to water them on the hour
Question: should I keep them alive?
Extreme loss of will-power
The dogs are too hot to yelp
I’m praying for a shower
– Not that it would help

Forty: the odour of rotting fruit

Creeps along the alley
Sweat breaks through my suit
It feels like death valley
I don’t like this at all
I wish that it was January
Paint is blistering on the wall

Fifty: to be outside is stupidity

To be inside is no joke
Extreme humidity
Increases the risk of heat stroke
Cracked throat, can’t cough
I’m not a fit bloke
Body functions are turning off

Sixty: too hot for Special Forces

Stopped sweating hours ago
Stench of rotting horses
Blood pressure is low
The failure of thermoregulation
Means there is nowhere left to go –
The last train is leaving the station

13
 Ye Tudor tower blocke

Made from finest English yew and oak

Standing tall, her quality bespoke
Her fifty floors are smoothed with daub and wattle
She rises proud and slender as a bottle
Ivy-covered and topped with thatch
Home to summer swallow and nuthatch
She is higher than the tallest tree
The shining jewel of London’s liberty
For pilgrim, knight or royal VIP
A priceless gift: peace and security
For wealthy merchant, squire or nobleman
A slice of London glamour, bought off plan
Here the cool and fashionable invest
For who would not desire an eagle's nest?
Exotic pleasures follow from their lease
The nightly chatter of Winchester geese
Turning his wooden crank, the spit rotator
Will hoist you upwards in the elevator
Enjoy the city spreading out below
The sparkling river Thames and Shakespeare’s O
We have the perfect place to meet and greet
So raise your tankard in the Marlow suite
For those who wish to keep their bodies trim
The building has a jousting mini gym
Before you leave, we hope that you will stop
To fill your trencher in Ye Turnip Shoppe
A high-rise chapel offers benediction
Except to those of Papist disposition!
Or, in ceaseless prayer from morn to night
To save your soul, a private anchorite
Just as man is host to flea and louse
Your animals are welcome in this house
A well-swept stall for stallion and mare
The freshest straw, because our ostlers care
Ye South Banke is now a national treasure
A favoured spot for tourism and leisure
Here from far and wide the people flock
To see a show or fighting bear or cock
To raise the roof, or fornicate or drink
And hear the groaning prisoners in the Clink
Pause here to freshen up and change your ruffle
Before enjoying theatre or brothel
Whether you dine on venison or pottage
We know that you will love our aerial cottage!

14
 Come dine with me

In such good company

the art of conversation can thrive.
The food was excellent –
well-chosen and in season.
For this reason, I am giving you a five.

I have eaten gazpacho before.

It’s somewhat passé, don’t you think?
A bit gauche, a bit nouveau riche .
At least there was plenty to pour.
For this reason, I am giving you a four.

For you, talk does not flow easily.

Your talents are not culinary.
Your menu, frankly, did not rise above the ordinary.
Beans on toast, I mean … really?
For reason, I am giving you a three.

I did not say anything

but there was a hair in my stew.
Your conversation was awkward
your cooking atrocious.
For this reason, I am giving you a two

You greeted your guests with a gun.

Three contracted food poisoning
another decided to run.
For this reason, I am giving you a one.

15
 I am not a cannibal

Before the rising of the sun

A package came from Amazon
He woke me from deep sleep that lad.
Was eating him really so bad?
He was … number one

It took me hours to get through

My boiler broke. What can you do?
The man they sent out was a dork
He tasted something like roast pork
He was … number two

I fell in love with that settee

It suited my flat perfectly
But five weeks is too long too wait
He paid the price for being late
He was … number three

Sunday morning. Knock on door

I’ve warned religious types before
He hinted at the fires below
My blood sugar was rather low
He was … number four

Without meat how can humans thrive?

It’s tasty and keeps us alive
Tesco forgot my weekly roast
From that moment their man was toast
He was … number five

I’m living somewhere in the sticks

I have few friends. I rarely mix
We talked a bit. I asked him in
Yes, it was probably a sin
He was … number six

Since I won't be going to heaven

I drove camper van to Devon
I saw him on a lonely path
Do I have to draw a graph?
He was … number seven

I had to fix my squeaky gate

But B&Q are second-rate
When I asked them what to do
That fellow didn't have a clue
He was ... number eight

16
 I said ‘Deliver no more wine!’
Ignoring me they crossed the line
I braised him slowly on the bone
With a delightful Cotes du Rhone
He was … number nine

They keep sending these useless men

Excuse me, there’s the bell again!
A voice inside me says it’s wrong
But now I’ve wronged, I must go on
Here comes … number ten

Philip Larkin is on Top of the Pops

Phil Larkin straps on his Gibson SG.

It's his chosen weapon of attack
for the blistering riff of Mr Bleaney.
He looks at Johnny Rotten – a flashback.
How he had played and played that first LP.
He wrote a letter; Johnny said join us.
That day he left the university.
He went down to London on the bus.
Steve Jones is toast, says the NME.
Larkin brings to the band a new energy.
Punk’s gain is a loss to the library –
each slab of noise is a sonic elegy.
Rotten scowls, from Matlock a cheeky grin.
One, two, three, four … Larkin counts them in.

17
 Leaving home

Five poems on any subject, in any style

Double-spaced, send SAE
No correspondence will be entered into
Said the Rules, solemnly

Carefully, I assembled them

In fresh coats, with labels, attached with string
Their faces were well-scrubbed
I wished them Godspeed – my little team

On a strange doorstep far away

They pushed on an unfamiliar bell
Like a town on the other side of an estuary
Light and sound came through a window

Someone answered, eventually

Feeling uncomfortable
They hung up their new coats
They walked across the border – the hallway

Of course they rhymed, they did not know how not to

Wearing clothes that seemed too formal
They mingled awkwardly
The other poems did not talk to them

One had a goatee

Another played the guitar
Another spoke five languages
They seemed to know each other already
My poems had one drink and left early

They told me, later, that they felt out of place

They were too gauche, too … provincial
Still scrubbed, in their party finery
They came home to me
It’s a big world – they just weren’t ready

Of course, they were sad, we all were

But no tears were shed
I gave them a hug and a hot chocolate
Carefully, I put them to bed

18
 Outsider

You are a slippery customer

you know where to go, what to do
You are the ultimate outsider
the king of the pavement crew.
Swaggering like you’ve won the lottery
you have shadowed us for years
gnawing bones in the cemetery.
When we left the wood, you followed us here –
our golden predator. You saunter
as bold as brass across the lawn
then dissolve, like mist, into the air.
You are our spectral visitor at dawn.
We seek you at night, but you are not there
Your remind us of what we once were

Jazz pigeons

They’re not gloomy, like crow or raven.

As twilight falls, just before dark
their self-confidence is craven.
Jazz pigeons have invaded the park!
These hooligans in fluorescent suits
are far too colourful for round here.
In a hungry cloud they strip our fruits.
Our birds are dowdy, like our beer.
Shocking in their bright green livery
they are hanging around the station
like a gang of Mods on a bank holiday.
Their raucous squawk is a provocation.
Who will liberate the English streets
of these foreign intruders, the parakeets!

19
 The stranger

You’re the shyest guest at the party

Your changing face has many moods
You charmed the guests on the balcony
You lit up the old house in the woods
You whipped the sea into a frenzy
You taught Orpheus to play the lyre
Without you there would no poetry
I bathed my face in your cold fire
You’re the witch doctor at the carnival
You gave us fever, you gave us rhyme
You linger around the hospital
Without you, there would be no time
Always invited you don’t always come
You’re mysterious, the zero in the sum

The sweet spot

Just like you to find the sweet spot –

the warmest place is the windowsill.
You lie in the sun, stretch and kill.
You are never troubled by regret.
You are almost divine: there and not there.
You track my steps in a zig-zag ritual
and charm me for your next meal.
Like a spell, you melt into the air.
You live in the present. You do not fret
about what might happen tomorrow.
You follow me around like a shadow.
I should be happy but I am not.
You occupy a circle of now
as you flex and curl. I envy you.

20
 Sullen Sid

Sullen Sid waits silently for trade.

Today's day-glo special – battered hake.
Business is less likely than a police raid.
Once, he pulled a huge carp from a lake.
Poor Sid, it isn’t much of a life.
He fills the fryer, sings the same song
endures the moods of his trouble and strife.
His motto – the customer is always wrong.
Now they don’t come. Like a bitter old toad
he’ll blame everyone but himself
curse the bright new chippy down the road
lug more pickled onions onto the shelf.
The spent fat, the plump carp, his grumpy wife.
Poor Sid. It isn’t much of a life.

Pavement trapeze with Special Brew

In the winter where do all the tramps go?

In their dark suits of mildewed plaid
We shy away from them, we would not follow

Gentlemen of the road, they like to bellow

Their battered top hats are tattered and frayed
In the winter where do all the tramps go?

A whimsical advertisement for Special Brew

Their pavement trapeze makes us afraid
We shy away from them, we would not follow

We would not smoke their hand-me-down tobacco

Of minor catastrophes their lives are made
In the winter where do all the tramps go?

If we offered our help, they might say no –

We live in fear of the tramp’s tirade
We shy away from them, we would not follow

When we are in the warm and the first snow

On the rooftops and velvet fields is laid
In the winter, where do all the tramps go?
We shy away from them, we would not follow

21
 British tear gas

British tear gas – excellent

It's far the best you see.
We're champions at crying
It's made from synergy.

It's great for others but the gas

Has worked for us for years.
It converts our angry mobs
Into blubbing babies – cheers.

The gas was perfected

In UK laboratories
By specialists in weeping
And lachrymosity.

We're born to disappointment

And not to liberty;
Bad weather, disgusting food
And only partially free.

The quince is our idea of fruit

We tolerate pollution.
We're too polite to have a crack
At income redistribution.

Cut to a fireworks display

The disappointed crowds.
Here, the sky is rarely seen
It's covered by dense clouds.

22
 Riot at Ford Open Prison

Tonight at Ford we'll all go wild

Because the salsa is too mild
Its glaring faults are there to see
There ain't no silver cutlery
Frozen croissants - please don't start
We're takin' this friggin' place apart

I knew weird things were going on

When they brought my filet mignon
'You call this steak well done,’ I said
'What colour is that, yeh? It's red
It just ain't good enough, you arse
An' what about my drama class?'

It's not just that they feed us sparsely

Only three kinds of friggin' parsly
Or that the wine list is deficient
The cultural offering insufficient
The Feng Shui is a friggin' disgrace
My emotions are all over the place

Been banged up for a year and half

I still ain't had a scented bath
This place is a friggin' liberty
An' whatever you think, it ain't just me
Last week, the tomatoes weren't sun dried
I hugged big Vernon, as he cried

He misses his music and his nan

Big Vern is a Schoenberg man
He yearns for the emotional schism
Of polytonal serialism
Take a man like that and feed him drivel
His soul is going to waste and shrivel

I told the screw – I ain't being Orphic

Vernon is culturally polymorphic
Ford Open Prison, tonight we go gaga
Ain't drinkin' no more Tesco's lager
This place is an indignity
It's the wrong kind of luxury

23
 The word mines

Each day I carry it: a sack of ideas.

My back is bent. Been doing it for years.
Past the theatre that won’t let me in
past pubs, those gilded palaces of sin.
Each day, I place imagery in my bag
no-one acknowledges my grind
to recover poetry from mere slag
for my hardship is of the wrong kind.
No-one notices me. I don’t care
as I struggle to unearth simile.
It’s dark and dangerous down there
sifting through mere spoil for poetry.
No-one sees me and no light shines.
It’s dangerous and dark in the word mines.

24