Fine. I’m fine

  

I didn’t know how I’d ended up on the floor

But there I was

The only one finding any amusement in the goings on

 

I felt my head

All ok

‘ambulance?ambulance?’ she repeated at me

 

I struggled to speak – I couldn’t tell if my brain wouldn’t instruct my mouth

Or vice-versa

But it wasn’t happening

 

‘nnnnnno. No.’

I got there after a few tries

Why was I on the floor?

 

The explanation came – I won’t go into it here

Suffice to say it was a new one to me

Old man maybe. The world is catching up to you, old man

 

Well, shit

I drank some water

Looked into the eyes of the few people around

 

To these strangers I was clearly both a liar and a fool

To her, I was lucky and a fool

In my head I split the difference

I kept repeating – because it was the truth

‘I’m fine.’

But No one believes an old fool

 

There is no moral to this story.

It’s just a story.

Though

At some point you find yourself on the cold-ass concrete

And it can take a while

To figure out how you got there.

 

 

 

 

Windows closed

  

It seems nowadays

That all one need do

In order to make a name for yourself

Is the same thing over and over

 

To buy the same bread from

The same market stall

Over and over

 

Commit the same crime

In the same signature style

Over and over

 

Write the same poems

About the same thing

Over and over

 

Until eventually you

Run out of steam

The market closes

The rain stops falling

Blood runs cold

Dogs sleep

The cars run out of gas

Dust devils making the horizon

Disappear

 

And then what

How do you define your remaining time

Here

 

A season changes

And the windows are closed

For the first time in a while

I do not care for the accepted rule

My writing remains centre-less

Orbiting as planets around my brain as dying star

 

The coffee pot is dry

A policeman is shot on the TV

Someone downstairs bangs and bangs and

Bangs

 

And in my head I make jokes

That I will never tell anyone

Because they’re just

Too

Goddamn

Funny.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Always straight ahead

  

More rain had fallen in the hour just past

Than on every day in the last month

And it fell on me

 

On the other side of the windscreen

Was a curtain of water

Car lights faded and the road met the sky

In a blur unseen at 60 miles per hour

 

Everything disappeared then

The road had no end

No symbolism

No metaphor

No soul or forgiveness

 

I looked for a break

For a time out

A sliver of blue or

Glint of light

A chance to just open the door and

Get out

 

Respite was not on the cards

The day remained a single lane

No hard shoulder

Stuck in a hell of inbetween places

Not really present and not really past

 

And though I knew what was there

At the end of the journey

Still my foot was held to the floor

Speeding blindly back to it.

 

 

 

Untitled

 

A meditation on monoxide

The siren’s singing bowl

Ear drum burst and a voice lost to concrete dust

 

The roads are littered with writers

Dead from the onset of spring

Poems half-written lay crumpled beside curb stone

Blown along by the final winter breeze

Pushing them down drains on its way out of town

 

And as magnets repel one another

Heat pushes instinct away

Blue sky raising dead spirits

Somewhere to lay heavy head supported now

By broken neck

 

How happy a world

A distinct lack of madness as interest dissipates

Interest in anything out there in the gleam

All so clean and naked

Truthful and honest and painfully dull

As

The summer threatens without storm

 

Just more yellow

More tomorrow

When

Really

Hearts seek out the nourishment of bones packed in ice

Sinew as lichen for the carnivore poets

who wander the landscape seeking darkness and thunder.

 

The roads are littered with writers

Dead from the onset of spring

And there I lay alongside

Them.

 

 

 

 

 

Come and get your steak

 

It was one of those days like one of those nights when

The storm blew into your face

Whichever way you stood

The world forcing its way down your throat

No escaping the shift of seasons

Unsubtle and sharp

 

The old lady tried to walk against it up the hill

The dog

Half dead

Followed on 3 legs

The 4^th limping as an afterthought

 

They were both fat and close to death

I bet myself which would be the first to go

And whether it would happen before they reached the

Top

 

I heard the mutt cough and gasp

            ‘come get your steak’ she garbled to it

 

I wasn’t sure if that was a bribe to keep moving

Or a reward for already crawling that far along the street

She dropped her 5 carrier bags and began to rummage around

I kept walking

 

A steak sounded good

But I needed to get out of this goddamn hurricane

That was cutting at me

Forcing me to stay still and

Keeping me from reaching summer in one piece.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Re-Side magazine

Happy to have work included in this issue of Re-Side mag