I’m looking through a door
into a pub’s store cupboard.
I can see piles of raring-to-go peanuts,
queues of patient WKD Blues,
rows and rows of lager
not even bothering getting to know each other.
I wonder if the man plonking Budweiser’s
into the plastic green carriers,
the kind that hold 10 bottles at a time,
has ever called the room his pantry.
The fruit ciders are scattered on shelves
like memories of mixed berries
on countryside bushes.
The man plonking Budweiser’s
into the plastic green carriers
kicks the door shut with his heel
to show a sign saying PRIVATE.
Maybe that explains my heart rate
or the ache of feeling uninvited.

© Carl Burkitt 2022