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P. A. Levy

AN ANSWER MESSAGE ON SICK LEAVE

Sorry there’s no one to take your call right now …

I want to spend the day alone with my afterthoughts,
picnicking on the slag heap hills and quarried valleys

of landscaped masterpieces inspired by wild purple
scars and bruises, and as each dandelion hour is taken

with a breeze that also scares the light
of my candle, by which I say

my prayers, or make promises
that get stuck in my teeth like spinach

there seems little difference, it’s just an excuse to challenge
my conscience to loop and replay, the memory game for free.

So I’m sorry I can’t take your call right now,
my soul is reeling with salmonella.

Please leave a message after the elongated bleep
that masks a tirade of my high pitched obscenities.

****

STICKMEN

I’ve got a funny feeling, I think I’m being watched,
some friends tell me it’s just paranoia (they say
I’m mad behind my back), but I’ve actually seen them,

I know exactly who they are, well that’s not strictly truthful
but I’ve witnessed them in dark corners,
listening in to my conversations, reading everything

I’ve ever written, laughing through my photo album,
pouring scorn on my CD collection. So I telephoned
the council, said I’m suffering infestation.

Mechanically, a grey voice answered to inform
that having checked her records of rodents and insects
and all kinds of pesky things; she can’t find stickmen.

Stickmen ain’t on the list. So I went to the library
to do a little research. I found Mr Men, but they were no help,
and when I got home my computer was logged on,

there they all were watching stickman porn.
Yes! Oh my God yes! There’s stickgirls as well,
and as any boy scout will tell you, it’s a sure fire

way to get smouldering action, but you try explaining
randy stickmen to the Fire Brigade
as they’re dousing down another blaze in your bedroom.

Having fled his native East End in a wheelchair (polio), P.A.Levy now hides in the heart of Suffolk countryside learning the lost arts of hedge mumbling and clod watching. He is an original member of the Clueless Collective and has been in many publications.