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in collection Tradesman’s Exit,
2009,
Shoestring Press, ISBN 978 1 908869
0 7
At the butcher's
palace of varieties
as a toddler by the drips
from rabbits with small bloody noses
waiting for a turn
to have their skins pulled inside out
like my raincoat in the cloakroom.
I learned to take for granted
contact with both flesh and money
was taboo and caged cashiers
must have each price recited
with panache to match the twirled
moustaches of a ringmaster.
When sawdust disappeared
and rabbits on trapezes vanished
with money-changers in straw hats
then Pantaloon went too
leaving simply sausages
and Grand-Guignol declined to sideshow.
I watch as Mr Hudson
prepares a pair of Barnsley chops;
he’s like a surgeon in Crimea
with his busy bonesaw.
Meticulous, he trims the fat
as if he’s read Leviticus.
Oddly, it’s his turn
to show a trace of nasal bleeding
above a nice plump lip. He mutters
what I owe, stiff-mouthed,
a second-string ventriloquist
with nowhere now to throw his voice.
Michael
Bartholomew-Biggs |
