Copyright © 2012 Sally Jenkinson

The author asserts the moral right under the Copyright,Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identifed as the author of

this work

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may bereproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in anyform or by any means without the prior written consent of theauthor, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding orcover other than that in which it is published and without a

similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

This edition published by Burning Eye Books 2012

www.burningeye.co.uk

@burningeye

ISBN 978 1 90913 601 4

OFFERING

Now look what you've done.I am sticky-slicked with the purple juiceof a million pilfered berries.Burst bubbles have bled black into fnger prickled stings.

I didn’t have a bag or a box. Cupped them in my left hand ‒held out in front of me, egg-and-spoon-stylesemi-precious in the sunlight.

Tripped, tricked that I was not flightlessby the rising wind and the ecstasy of stolen fruit.

Look I was going to say,look what I've brought for you.

Instead, gravel beds into my elbows and knee skin,and a squashed show of splattered blackberriesblooms across my heart-placelike a mean wet kiss.

7

THE GAS MAN COMETH

It’s a gas leak, sleepyhead,that fever fever red face fuzz.Holy carbon monoxide, don’t shut your eyes.We need to let the gas man in and look at the size of his belly.

The walls are mincing themselves like liver.I am stuck in this nest and they’ve been at my solar plexus with the ice cream scoop again.The gas man will be back in an hour to take another reading.

Gas Man, Gas Man is there going to be a quiz? It was six point fve, then two point ninethen one point something, then zero.Are you going to go and ring your supervisor, Gas Man?

He should check too, I’m glad to know you.Tell me again, how many months since you last had a cigarette?The sad twang of your cold sweat in my nostrilsso I know you’re still here.

Though my eyes won’t open themselves for fear that your high-vis will blind me.

They are fluorescent gods;we took them cups of tea at midnight.They are not luminescent,but they are excellent conductors of light.

The gas man says it’s going to snow tonight.He can feel it in his pipes.

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LULLABY

Your body gapes suddenly like a questionspitting you out of the rabbit hole of sleep.I peep over your shoulder, sigh, watch a mudslide closing the mouth of it.

You can’t fddle your feet back in,can’t wriggle yourself backwards andslide down in slim somnambulence to peace.Your white bones sing awake.

Synapses snap as tight as the muscles in your backridged with string, pinging a cat’s cradle of frightand the night scares me too, but wait,now we are up, there are leftovers in the fridge.

I will sprinkle vinegar in the water so our shells don’t crack when we boil ourselves.The night is not heavy; I will whip the whites of us to eggy peaks. Light like light, this happy foamlike no worries, like make us a rollie, babe,like stop looking out of the window, we are home.

I can order painkillers in English and French, dilute your fever in any chemist in the world, shoot the bandits baying at the door, knives between their teethjust like in that flm we saw before the heat made our brains swirl like soldering irons on skin, seeking to tell us something.

I think it said Simon Armitage has been haggling in the souks,and he’s coming to read us a story before bed.

So we better stuff our secrets in the sock drawer honeyand close your scratchy eyes.

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Simon’s a stickler for good listenersand he doesn’t like liars.

And there are those bloody bandits and their gnashing white grins.I grope a broken bottle in the dark,I can be tough, I will smash their shins.

On some days, life spews from youlike a singing godhead thirst,so I whisper if you want himyou’ll have to take me frst.

Clench my fsts, grit my teethyou’ll have to take me frst.

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