the unconsoled

 

the unconsoled (an extract)

a room mid-morning

there’s a monitor a sofa a bay window

with double glazing and other religions

neighbours’ houses back-lit a tree looms

a woman comes in

a man follows

they dance they argue they simulate sex

they sit on the sofa and watch Netflix   

finger food   surf   monthly installments

the audience become restless muttering

cough   a few stand up to leave

this in itself becomes a performance

a phone rings offstage goes on ringing

unanswered

a child begins to cry in the auditorium

unconsoled ...

quotient

 

quotient

 

She divided him into parts

little sums with deductions

She believed were additions

resolved him into simple elements

picking him apart like a straw man

until She could slip him into Her handbag

where he now lives with the clutter

in a broken-zipped side pocket

a husband’s paraphernalia

of lost keys and small change

mouse bones and a white feather

a leaking pen   a paperclip  

The Flow of Light

 

The flow of light

 

There’s little time for us now

now that your life is beginning

beginning to take shape

to be shaped by other hands

hands held shaken   kissed waved

waving goodbye a train taken

a leave-taking tunnels and bridges

arriving at destinations

unforeseen departures stations off my map

away from the backwater of my life  

the flow of light beckons

the dissolution of vapour trails

in frail blue skies

the glint of the sun on the tracks

carried away like a wave

the now taken out of sight

lost to a bend in the river

no looking back now

a shadow falls

 

the sun also rises

Decaocto

Decaocto or how long – a story of fate

 

Sunlight sliding through a window

a universe of dust motes

busy as atoms colliding

a door left open 

a collared dove calling

 

on the kitchen table  

a cup of coffee cooling -

the faint tracing of steam

unspooling in fragrant air -

a piece of string      a knife

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moirai

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eurasian_collared_dove

Alecto

Alecto in the revolving door (an extract)

 

1

How many years down the drain?

She’s on a roll now, a roller coaster

All her past clawing its way up the slope

Ratchet by fucking ratchet

The disappointment the bitterness the loss of hope   to

Launch itself into the present

She’s giddy with it nauseous

The push the rush the gush

Does it work like that?

To “do the right thing”

But to do it so badly

Held to account for unhappiness

Yours and mine 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alecto

deep water

it is deep water   it is shallow

 

language is a puddle

a clean white cloud condensed

dirty water reflecting sky

 

a swimming pool   the light all chopped up

the echoes   public fun   chlorine and piss

the shared privacy   the shower taken

 

the sea too   all that surface    the light dancing

the fetch   the crests   the troughs   and below

the continental shelf   rip tides and undercurrents    

the imagined sharks   the all too real shipwrecks   then

 

the melting icecaps   the far-off shores             distance          

 

the polar bear tiring   the muscle of life giving out   sinking slowly drifting down

into the mind’s dark telescope   silently as if the sound were turned off

yet leaving some residue of suffering in the empathetic ear   not quite heard

not quite a scream    not quite a prayer      not quite the word   

Lifeboat

  

Lifeboat

 

It’s letting in water

So he bails    a glass at a time

Not enough to slake his thirst

 

If only there were more time …

 

Lives flash before him

It’s so much of the same

And it takes so much time

 

He hoovers in the meantime, humming

Whistling whilst he mops the floor, rubs at the stains

Elbow grease and Radiohead

 

If only he were a stronger swimmer …

 

He’s killing time  

Betrays his wife and child

Calls the office and his mother

 

If only they’d pick up …

 

He’s up to his neck in the water

On his knees   He tries to pray   to sing

But he doesn’t know what boat he’s in