I watched a squirrel watching me
through the patio doors.
Its tail was up, answering the question
Where is that bright light coming from?
Its nose danced to the beat of its paws.
It could tell I was human
because I was eating Crunchy Nut with a spoon
and crying for no reason.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

My body travels
through new rooms
with an ease
my mind has never
kept up with.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

Here I am again listening to sad music,
hanging my head with Johnny Cash.
It’s nice to know my hands like my body
these days, how I can swim
with the man who comes around and not drown,
how I can remember that outside my window
are trees preparing to be climbed
by a bullet with seven teeth.
My headphones are dry,
the room I’m in smells of a pastéis de nata
and marshmallow shower gel
wrapped around a freshly made cup of tea.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

Written using sentences found by searching
for ‘play’ in my WhatsApp search bar

Just having a quick play.
Wanna play?
It looks like they’ve never played.
Are you playing Jenga with the car?
She seems quite happy playing
with an older dog and just being a dog.
I want to play.
I want to play all week.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

get fed once a day:
an empty Greek yogurt pot worth of grain
and the odd cabbage from a family member.
Barbara’s chickens peck my boots
but not my running trainers
and they have the face of a soap opera hard man.
To me, Barbara is
a square lawn and a bible in the kitchen.
Her muscles are dotted throughout the road
digging up her weeds, cleaning her windows,
updating the street’s WhatsApp.
Here bones are collected in a hospital,
resting.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

Your limbs are crawling
and your skin is discovering
corners of the house
where the ghosts our fingertips live.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

His palms are soft and from the past.
His daughter works in childcare.
She is only 19 and is a senior member.
She doesn’t have a partner
and definitely doesn’t want children.
She used to sit on Tony’s lap
and play with his grey stubble
and nibble on the end of his chippy tea chips.
She’s just like her mother.
It’s lovely how much she listens
and puts her arms around shoulders.
She smells like peaches.
Her cheek bones will never stop.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

Written using sentences found by searching
for ‘punch’ in my WhatsApp search bar

I had an instant hot flush
and punch in the gut feeling.
It’s not every day you get punched
in the arm by some random bloke in Sainsburys.
He punched me in the heart.
The punching nun puppet?
It’s amazing what you can do
with pipe cleaners and a hole punch,
hard liquor and a punching bag.
I’m pretty confident
you’ll never actually punch him.
Want to punch my kisses?

© Carl Burkitt 2021

and your knuckles are summer rain
hitting against the roof.
I’ve never taught you how to punch,
it’s as natural as skin.
There will come a time
when you ask me questions
about where I go on a Monday night
and I will say
Sometimes we are our own storm
and a stranger’s ears can be umbrellas
and you will probably ask for a Cheestring.

© Carl Burkitt 2021

There is a black and white cow
standing in the middle of a field
of grass and too many buttercups
to count. The sky looks like an advert
for the sky: a block of baby blue
and plump white clouds.
A red car is driving past,
the inside of the roof is grey.
There is a dark green sock,
roughly three inches long, lying across
the forehead of a dog with the words
‘hand’, ‘foot’ and ‘music’
written on three of its paws.
My skin is miserable and I don’t know why.

© Carl Burkitt 2021