The Enlightening
(a poem stretched between an opening and a closing line
of Borges)To have watched from one of your patios
on an evening dry of conversation the ancient stars
from the old bench that creaks like trees
that sound like an ocean and draw in darkness
where all the words I know are indoors
hidden in trembling fridges, crowded in darkness,
patiently waiting to reveal their colours,
damp or crisp as they wait for fingers and noise,
and leaning back, watching those lights beyond lights
while knowing I know no names for their movements,
their stillness, their places in constellations
or the flickering created by their distances
and to have noticed the lushness of water
pouring like joy from your bathroom beside the droop
of lustering jasmine and honeysuckle, their scent
slow as talcum powder seeping to the earth,
and to hear its gentle flow under the manhole,
soft on its gradual tilt towards blueness, and clouds
seen slowly from space, that lift it, nurse it,
while I'm stood on the rust of its lettering,
where my shoes, rocking on the imprints,
scuff as all that moves, all that's rarely said
flows beneath all that's between us
- these things perhaps are the poem.
A Poem For Winter Wednesdays
All praise be for wheelie bins. Everything
in moderation can end up in them.
Disasters from kitchens that foxes love,
Income Tax forms filled in too honestly,
love letters stained in sweet and sour sauce,
secrets from wardrobes in carrier bags,
broken kettles, fruit-juice cartons, new pins
from birthday shirts that felt crisp to put on.
And praise for those who drive here, empty them
into their tall trucks squeezed between stone walls.
Who just before Christmas are more tidy,
orange overalled, revving the engine,
shouting in Santa hats, waving cars past,
peeing discreetly in bushes, laughing.
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