40 NOT OUT

dear 40
made it - hello!
the age of recovery 
and 
fearless work sin hopeful
must
rise from tired drafts

this is home now - outlived most of the heroes
and
everyone on tv is childyoung now

will have 40 years of toxins massaged 
out my muscles
my
tired kidneys will them squeeze them free 
in golden streams all night
and
the
drs finger will helpfully search
around
inside my arse

dear 40
bicycle tires hang on the back of my bathroom door
and
lego men stand in line/plastic psychopaths on my desk

my
desk -
effort poems and short panicking prose
i post to electric ether
and 
tho 
my job does suck
it pays for trains and breakfast eggs
and
good people that struggle there
smile on me
in the 
lurid daytime week

dear 40
i've dug up the bodies/my cupboards are empty bare
i have stopped drinking all the booze
i waved my skeletons for therapists to record
and
i would take over the farm
if there were any chickens 
left anywhere 
anymore

dear 40 - not out!
but still ill
sick with the world blindness and headline lice
but
clean
with restraint 
survival 
and vented complaint
a migraine phoenix
from fire of exhausted youth and arrested development

dear 40 - i'm tired
and its difficult to think
ford 4.0
relaunched
repainted
new bugs
and
drs updates waiting 
in 
a 
rubber glove