I can’t play a musical instrument
but I pat my stomach like a bongo most days.
I remember when my ribs were xylophones.
I have a bum trumpet and pianoless piano fingers.
My toes are floorboard drumsticks,
my elbows are delicate triangles
and my armpit hairs vibrate like guitar strings.
My eyes feel like bass drums, battered every
second of the day. When I close them at night
I hear cymbals.

© Carl Burkitt 2020

My bedroom light switch is wired
the wrong way round. Up is on, down is off.
Every now and then, when my sleepy finger flicks the light off, the downward motion
makes the sun come up in Swindon,
bouncier than my red and yellow pogo stick.
I can smell chocolate spread on toast
and hear Right Said Fred downstairs.
I find a tenner under my skateboard,
chip my shins on logs, lose face skin on gravel.
I look in the mirror, clear my throat,
and practice saying Is Jason in? without stuttering.

© Carl Burkitt 2020

I’m not a white head spot popping kind of guy.
Puss has never been my game.
But squeezing the black heads on my nose
until a family of tiny worms wiggle their way free
totally hypnotises me. I wonder what they used to be.
Crisp grease? Filthy London air?
A build up of horrid catchy songs
grooving out for another dance?
If I could climb in my pores and have
a nose around, I would. Just to see why
all the grime is so desperate to stay inside me.

© Carl Burkitt 2020

A tiny thug kicked me in the hand.
It had no cause for violence
but went for it six times.
It had never even met me
but clearly knew all about me.
Each smack was a brush stroke
across a painting I thought was finished.
If my hand was a football it would’ve punctured.
If my fingers were piñatas they’d be
a thousand flying toffees.
I kept going back for more
but the tiny thug kept me waiting.

© Carl Burkitt 2020

I spent the day hiding in a woollen beanie.
It covered my head like cling film round leftover meat.
When I walked by my living room mirror
I caught a curl trying to escape
from my cranium tea cosy.
It looked like it didn’t know what it was doing
so I shoved it back undercover.
Two hours later the mirror told me
the curl had made its way out again.
I liked its spirit, so I shoved it back under again
to teach the rest of those hairs a thing or two.

© Carl Burkitt 2020