she hung about the mall,
her loose socks like dandelion clocks,
except she didn’t know how to tell
the time, she was fifteen, turned to crime,
she wore a touch-me-not school uniform
that would entice any fool, any salariman.
A “little whore”, a venus flytrap
that knew how to display her sundew
on the Japanese Webpage, “Hemlocks”,
with numerous teenage links
in the entertainment industry, has style
and a pistol, and mobile, and wears shirts
loud, very loud, like lesser celandine
yellow, drinks only the best French wine,
knows how to treat a lady, buys flowers
for her next of kin, no I’m only joking
he gives them nothing, but a slap,
but you’d like him, talk with him for hours
on how all life turns on a floral axis
needs to control, to dress in a lady’s smock
and act out his damp manga dream
in which he could bang her bad, make her scream
out for mercy, such power between the legs,
his philosophy taken from the dregs
of his coffee cup, the one in the Ministry
of Finance, it is of course, plain economics
the supply and demand, the surplus, the push
and pull the very essence of sex
a pub cafe that’s half asleep, sense
of years and years of frustration,
inner city unease and deeo blues
colour her words, cigarette smoke
blossoms, she clears her throat
as a local takes off his coat
and removes his tie, casually
like trees that lose their leaves
and his desire is autumnal,
off his grandfather at the nursery
where she paints red fuchias
and she exposes her tummy to all
the other kids with bright rosy futures
in banking and maybe insurance
who knows even in government,
a young diplomat shits his pants,
while she watches with amusement
and then she feels a little awkward
when at last she sees his wild orchid!
they order another round of lager
and wait for the teenage honey
to come on over, they badger
her, “sit here”, “Lift this”, she wears
hibiscus in her hair, and has an
unusually highly infectious laughter
that dates back to when he raped her
and translated her innocent childhood
into a very bleak and short adulthood.
