JOHNMICHAEL SIMON POETRY

She spoke in the common brogue
wrapping her tongue around the syllables
and spitting them out
one-by-one
like wads of chewed tobacco
her mastiff neck, shaven now
disclosed a brown growth on her ear
dribbled on like wet sand
dug from the depths of her briny past
 

He circled her deftly, mowing
at her close cropped scalp
from side to side and round again
until only a greying prickly fur remained
like drying litchen on a walnut rock

 

“Shorter, shorter” she snapped as the final
microns of stubble dropped onto the
hairy pile between his legs, pushing
close to her, flashing back, squat cigarette thrusting
at her crimson stained lips,
”get it over with, I can’t lie here all day
and he, pushing again into the final
weak relief, cigarette burning down to a stub
of acrid resentment swallowed like phlegm

 

She held the mirror behind her head
clucking critically like an old bird
”you left that line at the back again”
do I have to teach you how to get it off
each time you cut my hair?
fix it quickly now
will you never learn to get it right?”