New Poetry by Paul Tanner

the last bus

the lamppost hums.

holy shit,

there’s a ten-pound note sitting in the kerb –

I bend down, snatch it up, shake the rain off it:

it’s a bad job.

cheap paper. 

the queen wonky.

the colours faded.

I turn it over

and the other side’s blank.

can’t believe I was suckered:

it’s the bad street lighting.

this treacle lamppost glow,

it makes the forgery look glossy, 

a bloodier orange 

compared to the dark of the street

and I look around the dark of the street,

scared I’m being laughed at 

by boys in the bushes. 

what can I do? 

I drop it back in the kerb

cross the road 

and hide in the bushes with the boys, 

waiting for the next sucker. 

fucking bus never showed anyway. 

- © Paul Tanner 2020

Paul Tanner is a UK poet who no longer works essential retail and is still finding it difficult to believe a Tory government is paying him to stay home and write.