Hugo Williams

Hugo Williams Poems

I wonder will I speak to the girl
sitting opposite me on this train.
I wonder will my mouth open and say,
'Are you going all the way
...

I phone from time to time, to see if she’s
Changed the music on her answerphone.
'Tell me in two words,' goes the recording,
'what you were going to tell in a thousand.'
...

You paused for a moment and I heard you smoking
on the other end of the line.
I pictured your expression,
one eye screwed shut against the smoke
...

4.

The evening advances, then withdraws again
Leaving our cups and books like islands on the floor.
We are drifting, you and I,
As far from another as the young heroes
...

How do you think I feel
when you make me talk to you
and won't let me stop
till the words turn into a moan?
...

Everyone who made love the night before
was walking around with flashing red lights
on top of their heads-a white-haired old gentlemen,
a red-faced schoolboy, a pregnant woman
...

When I'm lying awake, listening to rain
hammering on the roof,
the phrase comes back to me,
our code for 'Let's get out of here'.
...

Whether it was putting in an extra beat,
or leaving one out, I couldn't tell.
My heart seemed to have forgotten
everything it ever knew
...

1

Are you still Chinese yellow?
Are your blinds still drawn
...

And so you cry for her, and the poem falls to the page
As if it knew all along that what we make of ourselves we take
From one another's hearts - tearing and shouting until we learn
How awkwardly, upstairs and behind shut doors we are born
...

They must be checking our location on the map,
taking leave of their loved ones,
asking the way to our house.
...

Now that she has left the room for a moment
to powder her nose,
we watch and wait, watch and wait,
for her to bring back the purpose into our lives.
...

13.

The smell of ammonia in the entrance hall.
The racing bike. The junk mail.
The timer switch whose single naked bulb
allowed us as far as the first floor.
...

Hugo Williams Biography

Hugo Williams (born Hugh Anthony Mordaunt Vyner Williams 20 February 1942) is a British poet, journalist and travel writer.)

The Best Poem Of Hugo Williams

Toilet

I wonder will I speak to the girl
sitting opposite me on this train.
I wonder will my mouth open and say,
'Are you going all the way
to Newcastle?' or 'Can I get you a coffee?'
Or will it simply go 'aaaaah'
as if it had a mind of its own?

Half closing eggshell blue eyes,
she runs her hand through her hair
so that it clings to the carriage cloth,
then slowly frees itself.
She finds a brush and her long fair hair
flies back and forth like an African fly-whisk,
making me feel dizzy.

Suddenly, without warning,
she packs it all away in a rubber band
because I have forgotten to look out
the window for a moment.
A coffee is granted permission
to pass between her lips
and does so eagerly, without fuss.

A tunnel finds us looking out the window
into one another's eyes. She leaves her seat,
but I know that she likes me
because the light saying 'TOILET'
has come on, a sign that she is lifting
her skirt, taking down her pants
and peeing all over my face.

Hugo Williams Comments

Sylvia Frances Chan 25 September 2021

CONGRATULATIONS being chosen by Poem Hunter and Team as The Poet Of The Day. Hoorray!

0 0 Reply
David Hazlett. 09 June 2020

I like Hugo Williams very much, always have.Human relationships, especially sexual ones are always exciting things to write about.Williams is a bit of a daring poet although not rude like Joyce. I am sure most of us have had similar thoughts and feelings.I remember that French phrase however, never put it in writing.

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