Deepest darkest London Bridge

Before I went to London Bridge to start the Shunt residency last week, a page from 'ghostweb' had already had me in stitches. 'Spirit energy', or the powers of photoshop? You decide...

Nonetheless, walking through Shunt lounge (pictured above!), the first sounds you hear are screams of terror from the London Dungeons. By night, the place is a gloomy maze of dark archways, eerie corners and green lights. Worse still, if you'd stumbled into the Vaults last week, you might have been ambushed by a terrifying group of apparitions: haggard, sun-starved, muttering. Yes, that's right, the most unearthly of species - poets in a bar.

The theme of our residency at Shunt was 'when no-one's listening', which strikes me as a ghostly topic in itself. The other performers all put me to shame with their inventiveness: poems featured an onslaught of paper aeroplanes, the voice of a drinker's liver, the subconscious mind of Dave and even the voice of God. My piece was about the things objects in the bar might say to each other when there's no-one around, and it's posted below, just for a laff...

While you weren’t listening...

I heard the glass
say to the tabletop:
I like the way you hold me.

I heard the table
answer back:
I like the way you feel.

The barstools
thanked the floor
for all the nights it propped them up

And though
I didn’t catch the floor’s reply
it sounded delicate

and I wondered
what the wind says to the trees outside
to make them swoon like that

and what it tells
the grass
to set it shivering,

or what it is
that’s spoken when you
press that bottle to your lips,

what passes there
between you
in that silent and repeated kiss

that seems to say
I’m here,
I’m listening.