What if those moments you jolt yourself awake –
you know the times you think you’re falling
and find yourself crashing landing in bed,
the moments that feel like you pulled your guard up
to defend yourself from subconscious danger –
what if those moments are in fact the ghost
of a loved one shaking you awake?
A loved one keen to see your eyes again
or desperate to urge you to write down that
idea you just had before sleep steals it forever.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Rachel Riley
Swapped the vowels
In her name for consonants.
It took Nick Hewer a few weeks
To get used to saying “Rtchfl Rglfy”
But he did it because
He was a bloody professional.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
They should’ve called it
Stressfulteen Stressfulteen. Christ.
Bloody stressful…teen.
#HaikuReview | Carl Burkitt
I’m dying to go to the loo.
I’m dying for some crisps.
I’m dying to see that film.
I’m dying for a drink.
I often think of him
surrounded by other ghosts
with empty bladders, fistfuls of Pringles,
bums on cinema seats, sipping large Cokes,
when all he wanted
was to get home a little sooner.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Rod Stewart
Knew what he had to do
But didn’t do it.
“I’m 75, you shits!”
He’d shout in the street.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Standing at the urinals,
the peripheral vision man sneaked a look
and whispered Congratulations.
For a fleeting moment I forgot he was a colleague
referring to some good news
I’d announced earlier that day
and just looked down in the joy of a human
simply celebrating another human.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
“Sean Paul, Dawn called.”
My God, Sean Paul loved his PA,
He never missed a message.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Whenever I see a parent enter
a baby changing cubicle,
they always leave with the same baby.
If there was an adult changing cubicle
I would use public loos most mornings.
I wouldn’t make wholesale changes,
just enough to see myself the way you do.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Nick Nolte
Loved a balti.
For breakfast.
Yuck.
How revolti.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
