Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


You Wake Up Beside This Person


You wake up beside this person
In bed in the boarding house

And you see the pittance of change
On the dust-covered dressing table
That's supposed to last all week
But won't
And you think,

Well where is that which
The aftershave promised?
And which his new shirt promised?
And his urgent kiss?
And his slow caress?

And you see your lipstick
On the table and you think

Well what did I promise?
What have I pretended?
Will he know my truth?
Will he accept it?
Will he love it?

And only then
In the boarding house
Do you think,

I know nothing about this shape
Beside me
Oh I know his coat
His smile
His eyes
His hair,

His shoes
As he walks the promenade,

And his hand
On the spoon of honey
At the breakfast table,

But I know nothing
Nothing
About him.

Him.

Who is he?
You ask yourself,

You ask,
Who is he?

And you know so little of him -
Of the tide of his blood in him -

What he really wants and thinks
And fears and loves and forgets
And hates and plans and remembers -

You know so little of him
He may as well be
Some shadow drowned at the bottom
Of some midnight ocean.

And what does he think I am?
What is he... convinced...
I am?

Coming home on that train
Back to Liverpool...
Despite the fear of mother's anger,
It was a relief,
An escape.

From the shadow silent
Sleeping in the bed.


- from "Uncle Harry and the Melting Moon"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Tatyana Nyshko - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


You Know What?


You know what?
An hour after I was made -
Just after you were born - she got tired of me
And handed me a pair of lead boots
And an overcoat of cobwebs
And marched me out the door to search for pennies.

Yeah? And I was a right mug - I'd bring them back,
Clawed out of the sea-cold soil
With worms still clinging like babies
To their curves and faces,
And I - what a fool I was -
I'd look up at her from the November mud
On my iron shoes and wait desperately for her slow kiss
In her candlelight. But the kitchen cupboard was bare
And I got none.

Your mother, see -
She had second thoughts about love.
She preferred coins to my kisses.
Because she could control them, hold them in her palm.

Not like my kisses - they were too wide for her.
Frightened her. More than she bargained for.


- from "Wedding Rings and Space Suits"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Beenana - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


With Your Lips a Sugared Inch From His


Like, when I was a newlywed blushing before
The watching kitchen toaster, it was a relief to unfold
Into someone then - in the caress of your own walls
And his warm silence,

With your lips a sugared inch from his,
You could say,
"My heart hardens into oak
Sometimes, does yours, does yours..?"

It was like whispering yourself home,
The spring you'd wound inside you
All your nervous years could at last uncoil,
You could say,

"Sometimes I rage like scarlet
And sometimes I freeze like cobalt
Do you, tell me you do, do you...?"

But a few years with a ring's razored mouth
Biting your thin bone finger and what do you do?
When you're aware of how fast the burning clock
Is racing on the wall?

Bolt down your shoulders again,
Seal them with a rivet gun and an acetylene torch,
Frightened of all your colours in his clenched fists
That he can use against you.


- from "Wedding Rings and Space Suits"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Paul Posthouwer - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


Wide World Whizzing By


The window.
The wide world whizzing by.
All these moments judging me.

The muddy cow in the field.
The iron gate, broken.
The cloud, sadder than your mother's tears.
The hill catching sunlight.
Someone's forgotten car
Nudging the hedgerows in a ditch.

They say,
Deep and slow, their coal voices murmur
"What have you been in your life, Anne?
What have you become, Anne?
What have you known, Anne?"

I'm not good enough to look at them,
Not good enough to lick their boots.
I'm the Scrap Paper Girl.


- from "Wedding Rings and Space Suits"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Jordan Lewy - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


What Fireworks Do You Ignite Now, Mrs Married?


What fireworks
Do you ignite now, Mrs Married?
A loaf of bread and a torn dishcloth!

I was so betrayed by love -
Your mother was so reluctant to kiss me, hold me -
So how come you got married? Eh?

How could you trust something as small as love?
Why was your mouth so eager to taste my mistakes?


- from "Wedding Rings and Space Suits"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Andreas Meyer - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


Walking Book


A sponge, that's me,
Soaking up this that and whatever
To keep out the night,
As long as the night's outside me
I'm a robber with no conscience.

At night, I can hear my skin made up of
Thousands of lips babbling and shouting
Into the dark,
Other peoples' voices whispering Mondays
And shouting Tuesdays and the harder I try to listen
To hear what I'm saying –

Hah, can you believe what I've just said,
It's not what I'm saying at all is it,
All my stealing mouth is fit for
Is saying what others say, what they're saying
But the harder I try to hear it

The louder the voices get because
Even my ears, even my ears are made up
Of someone's lips, talking and shouting.

I'm just a book, aren't I?
A walking book I've invited
Other people to write.


- from "Wedding Rings and Space Suits"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Tinka - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


Since When Do Kisses Pay Bills?


Oh grow up!
Since when do kisses pay bills?
You haven't thought
Any of this out, have you?

I mean look at you -
Fancy cigars,
American wallet -
Your shirt collar swamps you!

We've run out of money
And we've only been here a week!
Dreamer!

And the way you stood
At the train station.
Sniffing the air and shuffling
Like some pickpocket
Just let out of prison.

All the other girls were arm
In smiling arm
With their fresh-pressed soldier boys,
But you made me look cheap.


- from "Uncle Harry and the Melting Moon"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Gresei - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


Mother Wound up the Mantelpiece Clock


Mother leant back in her chair
And wound up the mantelpiece clock
And she waited -
On the breath of its tick she waited.

For me to strike the golden hour
To set her heart chiming.

For me to take the umbilical between us
Far across the surging sea
To channel her blood in my body across
The oceans and burn her flesh bright into
A star upon the stages of the world.

My lungs to breathe the air
She never tasted.
My feet upon the ground she'd never touch.

New York.
Broadway.
Hollywood.

The flash of smiling cameras
Impatient gleam of purring cadillacs

And above all the wet-inked
And hot-pressed newspapers
Leaping onto street corners shouting
"This Woman The World Wants!"


- from "Uncle Harry and the Melting Moon"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Sly - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


The World Has Forgotten Me


The world has forgotten me.
I am just another shadow
In this sprawling city,
That eats, sleeps, works, alone, apart -

A solitary insect tapping out her age
In the hollow walls of a crumbling house.   

And each street of this city
Is lined with my brothers and sisters:
The shadowed husks.
The forgotten people.

And through all this,
The world turns away
Its head and stays busy,

And rides its trams down to the Mersey
And rides its trams up from the Mersey

And opens its shops in the brassy morning
And shuts its shops in the murmuring night

And newspapers prattle
And newspapers babble -

But not about us: no.
Always the eyes of the world
On someone else!

On the smooth walking
Warm rich and famous.

When you first screamed the air,
I said,
While I can merely walk,
She shall have
The wings to fly;

While I stumble under
The leaden weight of words
When I talk,
She shall have the silken threads
Of the sun to let her sing.


- from "Uncle Harry and the Melting Moon"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © Jan Inberg - Fotolia.com

Paul Badger
www.paulbadger.com


Unpick the Thread Inside Your Heart


Unpick the thread inside your heart and
Be what the world wants you to be -

And it shall always need you,
Want you...
Love you.

Be loved by the world,
Not forgotten like me
And the rest of this city!

Serve it well.
And take the fire.
The glow.
The burning.

When the stars savour the silver screen,
They ladle their spoons into the clock:
Instead of being eaten by time,
They make time their dish.
We slave under the laws of the world,
But the famous devour them!

When your father kissed me,
It was done and gone;
A moment elbowed away by clouds,
And all the birds swooned
Into the shrinking space
And replaced it.

But the kisses of the famous last forever!
When you smile upon the screen,
You shall be loved for as long as the
Clicking film whirrs in the projector,
And all the cameras of the world
Shall make their valentine eyes
At you, and you alone!


- from "Uncle Harry and the Melting Moon"


Copyright © Paul Badger 2010
Photo © James Steidl - Fotolia.com