Upon Reflection

I came five minutes too late.
Just five minutes.
The bed was still unmade in your mind,
Soft folds that told no lies.
My eyes saw nothing of the tender scenes
That bowed your head
Tore at the pillowcases
And silenced the words that I never said.

I came five minutes too late.
Just
Five
Minutes.

untitled un-sung

Linger once or twice
Before you go
And perhaps those words,
Like liquid in your eyes,
Will fall like fat summer rain
On these arid encounters.

Too much.

My blue boy
With the child’s smile
That splits that solemn face
And leaves echoes of warm twilight;
Cardamom soft, sleepy heat
Tempered by cool nocturnal wanderings
Through places sickened by night.

minet

Your scent is of heat,
Of dark-places
Of displaced tableaux
Played out, unseen, in suburban gloom.

Of days, long days, that seem to have no end
And a waiting window, illuminated.
Wallpaper you didn’t choose
Reminds you how far you are from home.

Of the places you long to be
When the night is black and stark corridors call.
Dusty faced they sing to you
Songs you tried not to hear.

Come walk with me in these dark interludes,
Where the silence hangs heavy
With the restless crackle of anticipation.
Your age shows in your little hands.

crows

I heard the crows calling today,
From the silhouetted trees by the church.
Footfalls cracked against alley walls
That climb either side, moss covered
And slippery.
The breeze turned cold as the sun sank into the hills.
A pink tinted sky blushed overhead
As the crows filled the trees
Black tar drop eyes.
They sat
Waiting,
Hunched in the branches
Like mourners.

Leaves

You huddle into your collar
And shiver
As the breath of Autumn
Catches in your hair.

A word trembles on your lips,
Then, forgotten, falls.
The leaves that scratch your shoes
Are still now.

Their fragile skeletons
Leap with the wind
Until, crushed underfoot.
They murmur no protest.

Drinking Song #3

Fools, like moths,
Around a lightbulb flutter.
A chaotic dance
Bathed in sulphur glow

Weary hands
Make pink-fingered gestures
To eyes that smudge
These nights like chalk dust.

Sing these songs
In streets static with rage
The crackling air
Pulses darkly through your veins.

And when the streets are bleached
By the moon’s melancholy luster,
Let he who walks alone and tall
Be invincible in this silent hour.

untitled #2

These twisted streets
That meander through Autumn
Echo with the footfalls
Of men long passed.
these boughs that sweep overhead
A crackle against the stormy sky
look down, weeping.
The place where you last saw that face
Still possesses a faint outline,
A blur on the tree trunks,
A whisper in the fluttering leaves
That reminds you
What is lost.