From 'The Manager's Poems': Shirt and Tie -- by File

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I flapped and bulged as a clean white shirt
On a suburban nylon washing line
One of many, line after line, dentures in the wind
Then I hung passively absorbing rain
And eventually also bleeding rust from the spring in the clip
Sepia seeping into me, stained teeth

I pondered lonely as a shroud
Sunken over decayed flesh
The weight of ages is the weight of tissue, I wait for morning
When I will be squeezed around the middle and pulled
While the pegs are removed
And then thrown into a plastic bag to wait
For the next cycle of whites


Silky coils sleeping on the jungle floor
Where I slipped after failing to hold my hanger
That was sometime ago now and dust has settled
In the crease you made from your vicious V
That failed to impress the disciplinary board
And failed to help you explain it to your wife

Wrapped I was, with care, that day
Around a stainless starched white neck
And you had no reason to suspect that my performance
Would be anything less than Spectacular
But it is hard to shine in the dim light from under the wardrobe door
Amongst boxes and crumpled balls of paper, your friend,
That so acutely remind me of the fate of my friend, your shirt,
Damp and creased and soiled in a plastic bag downstairs

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