Giftshop

Bothered dads with bum bags,
plastic straws in rucksacks,
boxes of smeared sandwiches,
some with babies bouncing full nappies
in their marsupial holsters,
some with fingers red from airfix,
all with the nervous eyebrows
of Charlton Heston in that movie
Planet of the Children,
stand with handfuls of pencils,
grimacing at the checkout girls.
Mothers float like squids,
toddlers plucking at their tendrils,
past giant stuffed geckos and apes,
deformed orcas with impossible smiles,
tubs of rubber dinosaurs.
The assistants grin like auctioneers,
throwing paper pterodactyls like lures
into crowds of clammy hands.
Vacant little girls gaze
into cases of glistening stones.
One father strikes a tragic pose,
a novelty pencil sharpener in one hand,
the other working at his scalp,
then darting to his wallet only to flip
like a helpless fin into the air
with the choice despair of parents
forced to cough for nibs of plastic
and baubles of rubber put in paper bags.
In the entrance way a girl in frills
swells like a bullfrog, screams,
and tears apart a doll.