The Listless

A world with no lists.
Nothing is catalogued or ranked.

One
Thing
Does
Not
Come
After.
Above,
Below
Another.

No set of instructions on how
It must be built, made, born.

Folk know or they don’t.
One word does not follow another.

There are no guides, dictionaries,
Encyclopedias, instructions included.

Our eyes don’t flick from one
to the other. No episodes.

Things lack a queue in which to happen.
We live by chaos. There is no sense in order.

This explanation is for the listful.

The List

Their companion gone
old men stoop lower
with less in their basket

try to recall her shopping list,
“Was it Robinson’s marmalade,
Or Hartley’s lemonade?

Spam. No she never liked spam.
Never enough fat on bacon.
“Yes, I need a receipt, young man”

Paul Brookes is a shop asst. His chapbooks are The Fabulous Invention Of Barnsley, (Dearne Community Arts, 1993). The Headpoke and Firewedding (Alien Buddha Press, 2017), A World Where and She Needs That Edge (Nixes Mate Press, 2017, 2018) The Spermbot Blues (OpPRESS, 2017), Forthcoming Ghost Holiday (Alien Buddha Press)