Simples

So there’s this girl,
right,
as there often is.
And she puts a certain
spring into my step

like when you know
that if things keep going
the way they’ve been going
you might end up
doing something
you most definitely
will regret.

But what the hell,
life is short right?
And if not, then at least
I have some time to make
amends. So I’ll make my
mistakes now and
learn from them.

Besides,
when she smiles
all I can think of
is her.

For Mum

When someone you love dies
the sky is no longer
just blue.
It is a million different shades of blue
and grey and white
and each day seems somehow shorter
and the wind tastes bitter in your mouth
like the salt in the wound
like the salt in your tears
when someone you love
is gone.

From the morning

In a dream of the world
to be perfect
and you coming over the brow of a hill
and your hair.

This is the inner of me.
The twinkle of humour
and innocence
in everyday
and the wish
of you in mine.

Having the blues.

I was really
having the blues
today.

Other days have come and I have had
the sweetest nectarines,
with deep blushing reds
and violent orange yellows.
And the world full of green and clear
and pushing away from me.

But today
I was really
having the blues.
What colour will tomorrow be?

Mark.

I have a creeping guilt.

So lucid and empty,
I roll my eyes and snort
and scowl effervescent.
Pain deep pitted in my stomach.

I haven’t been there when he’s
needed me
I’ve left him alone
as his eyes grow a deeper and deeper red.

I’ve been blind to sorrow
and love
but not to distaste.

No, not to distaste.

Where’s the grandmother and the kettle and the almanac and the girl?

Driving at night. Going
somewhere.

We listened to skipping electro beats
and the rain pit-pattering.
I wasn’t driving.
Absent-mindedly fondling cd covers
Arcade Fire, Fionn Regan, Bjork.
Full, longing voices.
I felt so empty.

Gazing out the window
at the headlamps’ light
glittering off the slick, wet street,
the catseyes.
I have no tears left from you.

Then, when the song ended,
we passed under a bridge
and for a second,
maybe two,
there was perfect silence
and I could see far and long into the night,
but all I could see was the night.
This is the worst pain ever. <b

The Gym

500 laps of the pool down,
the water warm and dead in my mouth.
Weights. 60, 70, 80 kilograms
Lift and drop
Lift and drop
ringing in my brain.
The constant thud of foot
on rubber, rolling
3 more kilometres
another thousand metres
rowing this sea of sweat and skin.
Just another 30 meaningless minutes on the bike.
Where am I going?
The ultimate self-defacement, mutilation.
Ever muscle burns, the salt stinging my eyes,
I’ll thunder on.

And all of this because
I can’t get you the fuck out of my head.

This is the day.

The smooth expanse of supple black leather that is my desk,
like a stretched and scraped skin left to dry and shine,
the biggest man you ever saw.
And the to-and-fros of bobbing heads from my window.
Tree branches like fingers
groping for that yellowing golden noose
of lamplight.

These are all I have left,
these and my old worn cassette player.
We had good times.

Perhaps I should eat a slice of butterless toast
and go dance new-born in the rain.
This is the day I forget about you.

When words have no effect.

This is a view of you in your dark green glasses
from the little photographic plate
inside my head.
Your tight freckles
humming along,
and your short hair
that I stupidly felt the need to explain.

You’re a painter and a poet
and better than me
and I don’t blame you.
I deserve this empty house
I’m sure.

But the more I look at this little globe
and the long, dark, slick expanse
of the wet courtyard in front of me
the more I feel my distance from you.
I’ve never missed someone’s hands more.

If it weren’t raining so hard
in the small green overgrown garden out my window
I’d go outside
and hang my heart out on a rose bush to dry,
because if you looked you’d see
that it’s raining pretty heavily
in here too.

Flight.

I’ll never smell lemons
the same way again.

I tell you
dying ain’t easy.
And having it take you by suprise
doesn’t make it any better.

Some manage it
with a slow trickling away
of life.
Sliding down the sleeves and out the cuffs.
Or maybe
Feeling its gentle journey down each leg, flooding shoes and boots alike,
scarletting socks.
It’s a slow release.

No such mess here.
No storm
signifying ‘madman’ness, all-over-the-shopness,
no series of screams.

Nothing so dramatic.
I am just cold.