Poem: Alan Close by Rachel Blake

Alan Close
by Rachel Blake

 
Alan Close’s feet escape the quilt in the night,
Frost on his tarmac in the morning.

Every evening when it rains
Alan Close
Takes a glass of water to bed
To sip before sleep – then awakes perturbed,
a circular film of dust on the surface.

He is a neat man,
His cuffs are white.
Alan Close has electric garage doors, one per house;
None of which have rusted.

Alan Close (Mister) hasn’t had a woman in five and a half years.
If and when the children are locked out to play,
The Alan Close parents (numbers 8, 45 and 69) draw the curtains.

He touches his own soft belly and arms,
And walks to work now, in greying trainers –
Sensible shoes in his bag.
A skip on the driveway of number 22,
Scaffolding enfolds a house stump.

On the second Thursday of every month
He goes to book club, a small affair
(Alan Close drinks two glasses of white).
Tuesday is bin day on Alan Close,
49’s recycling contains coffee jars.
Like fresh, less expensive.

• A number of talented Huntington School year 10 students took part in a one-day writing workshop – and YorkMix is delighted to be the first to publish their work
• To find out more about the creative writing workshop, and to read the other students’ work, click here