My hand is a slice of pizza.
My hand is a nappy shovel.
My hand is a retired ham.
My hand is an old lover.
My hand is a thousand creaky gates.
My hand is a mouse conductor.
My hand is a caravan for veins.
My hand is cotton wool stapled to a desk.
My hand is an overstuffed glove.
My hand knows what it’s up to.
My hand is a liar.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
A giant harness wrapped around the roof
and, before I knew it, a mechanical arm
tore it out of the ground, taking with it
every fingerprint smudge from past
journeys across a faded map.
It took every timetable squint,
every smug on-time passenger look,
every late comer For fuck’s sake.
It took all the small talk and the no talk
and the please stop talking
and the let me know if you want to talk
and the wish we could really talk
and it just took it – bang –
and replaced it with a fresh start.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Harry Hill said
I realised I was going bald
when it took me longer
and longer to wash my face.
I realised I was getting tall
when I started standing further
and further away from stages.
I realised I was getting old
when peanuts found it easier
and easier to stick in my gums.
I realised I was getting low
when my body found it harder
and harder to connect with my brain
or kick off the duvet
or smile at people in shops
or enjoy the smell of baking bread.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Dehydrated potato
© Carl Burkitt 2020
I almost cried on my barber today
when he asked me if I thought it was sad
how, at the age of 21,
he didn’t enjoy drinking
or going to parties
or being in large groups
and his best friends are his mum,
his girlfriend, and his boss (in that order)
and his ideal sort of day
is waking up when his body lets him,
having zero plans and resting
both his body and his mind.
When he sprayed my neck
with the scent of cloves and oranges
he’d hand chosen for the festive season,
I replied,
Your life smells pretty content, mate.
His laugh was soft, but long.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
When I’m in a room
that is pitch black
I walk around
with my eyes closed.
I wonder what
I’m scared to see.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
I am not the ‘I’
in my poems.
I am the ‘Y’,
shrugging my arms
to the sky
in another day.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
surrounded by furniture woods.
Creaky floorboard leaves
crunch under my slipper boots.
I want to chop something.
The weak radiator sun won’t stop my bones
shivering against charity shop checks.
Blunt white axes clatter in my mouth.
I need to chop at something useless;
my slowly softening hands won’t let me.
© Carl Burkitt 2020
Carl tells tales 