A & O

Photograph by Itkupilli

:(

In about 5 days, my man friday is leaving for the land of the rising sun.

"Oh, Jesus wept".
and so he should

Free fall

Some people are on the edge. I've already jumped and I'm just looking for the least lethal place to land. A compromise of a compromise of a promise.

How long can I keep pushing? Things are changing. I'm changing. I am stretching so fast it's tearing me apart. I still can't touch the other side. I don't know that I want to.

The music drowns todays issues and reminds me of yesterdays. This iPod feeds the addiction of my ears. My tempanic membranes keeping perfect time under extreme audio assault. I'm drinking it in - floating in a pool of repose. The songs drum up memories. The drums are building to a crescendo. It brings me close that black floating ball. Today it's surrounded by an dark slick. I can't handle its touch. I already know this. This life has developed somewhat of a twitch in me.

The drum beats. My heart beats. I saw my own face, grey and ashen, music playing, coffee in hand, no more worries. My sons bring me back. They tug at my stopped heart. It beats for them. I fight for them. They struggle for my attention. I ration it to them, but I don't know why. Sometimes I love so hard it can crush. She loves so effortlessly. It makes me suspicious for no good reason. She is the lightning rod to ground my charge. She floats. I fall.

walking on

alone, on a brown stone path
walks a shadow,
a stolen glance
and stories
cached in the
cafeteria walls.

Thistles by Ted Hughes

Against the rubber tongues of cows and the hoeing hands of men
Thistles spike the summer air
And crackle open under a blue-black pressure.

Every one a revengeful burst
Of resurrection, a grasped fistful
Of splintered weapons and Icelandic frost thrust up

From the underground stain of a decayed Viking.
They are like pale hair and the gutturals of dialects.
Every one manages a plume of blood.

Then they grow grey like men.
Mown down, it is a feud. Their sons appear
Stiff with weapons, fighting back over the same ground.

Old Poet by Norman MacCaig

The alder tree
shrivelled by the salt wind
has lived so long
it has carried and sheltered
its own weight
of nests.

The Dance by RS Thomas

She is young. Have I the right
Even to name her? Child,
It is not love I offer
Your quick limbs, your eyes;
Only the barren homage
Of an old man whom time
Crucifies. Take my hand
A moment in the dance,
Ignoring its sly pressure,
The dry rut of age,
And lead me under the boughs
of innocence. Let me smell
My youth again in your hair.

IN CALLING FORTH AND STRENGTHENING THE IMAGINATION IN BOYHOOD AND EARLY YOUTH

from first dawn
by day or star-light
everlasting motion

little jimmy norcliffe
he looked after me
sorted me out
with a good shovel
and a pair of wellingtons

high objects
the mean and vulgar
works of man

showed me how to dig
without hurting my back
to lay concrete slabs
write out betting slips
on a bag of cement

enduring things
life and nature
purifying