Pick’n’Mix
 
Perks of working in a chemist?
Patients handing in unwanted meds like an amnesty.
Her quick eye's camera capturing their names,
before chucking them in dedicated bin with faux casualness.
She learned fast; pumped the male pharmacist,
using youth and pretty-face assets, 
for drugs' legit purpose, as if dead keen to learn,
then googled for their recreational benefits.
 
Her cheery ‘Enjoy’ as chemist left for lunch,
customers drying to a trickle,
she raided the repository like an adult pick'n'mix,
tingle in finger tips, breast, clitoris
as she conjured mental audit of its contents
panting in climax thrill at each panhandled find
Pregabalin, Paracodol , Prozac
lucky dip of unfamiliar meds deposited by other assistants
she extreme-sports shrugged Give them a try.
Sometimes the black truffles of diazepam,
stuffing her stash in shoplifting-big bag.
Afternoon spent high already on anticipation
like an assignation with a drop-dead lover.
 
On sofa, party food for one; crisps, biscuits, chocolate.
On coffee table, spliff making paraphernalia and med haul.
Takes her pick, then settles back to shed 20 years’ worth,
children pointing What’s wrong with her?
adults gawping at father’s thalidomide legacy .

Fiona Sinclair

If you have any comments on this poem,  Fiona Sinclair  would be pleased to hear from you.