- Vol. 09
- Chapter 10
A Pay Cheque Away
The Circle Line’s Mr No-Name’s home
from home after bunking
in barracks. His get out clause
to escape sour milk. He won
a scholarship to study sculpture
but signed up instead. The Circle Line
Tube’s Mr No-Names shop
doorway. Mower his nod
to sculpture-couture his concept
of homeless trolleys, black
bin liners. The Circle Line’s his temp
garden shed. On days off instead
of grass cuttings he keeps dirty
laundry from Number 10, Iraq
Monday to Friday and his pug’s
nest. At lights out he leaves
the mower as welcome mat
Lesson to late comers, commuters
pub overspill stepping over objects
as they do with him when he sits
with a beret begging for dog food
When the old guard tells him to shift
his carcass from the Circle Line, sleep
on a bench. Even though there’s no
A Pay Cheque Away
parking on single yellow lines
it’s Mr No-Name's one fingered
salute to the Brass. His white line
drawn in Afghanistan’s sand
The mower he hawks from door
to door — His creative-couture
in The Big Issue’s Grass Cutting
Edition. He deposits dirty duds
like a bush in a drive-in. Refills
his grass-box laundry bag after giving
verges his couture-sculpture
of his old short back and sides. His pug
ambles around before his train-bed
beckons. The sound of a lullaby
on the wrong side of the tracks
Until next time their ticket runs out