Family
Can be a nest of vipers
The greatest joy
An empty glass
The pain you feel when it matters most
Strangers
The best of times
The cruelest cut
A Sunday
Morning
Before the squirrels are out
You leave the house you grew up in
The walls and plaster and wood of it
Walking fast into town
Empty ships, last night’s slips
A faint odor of terpentine
The market stalls are bare awaiting their traders
Sun is hardly met in sky
You don’t know why
You escape the warmth to be in the cold
Where things unsaid ring truer
In the little park off by the church
Horse chestnuts have fallen
Ivy grows lush
Statues keep their secrets
And imported flowers are red among the green
Like Spanish dancers
You remember
The hollow feeling
And the times it wasn’t
The whoop and rush of emotion
Now you are older and still you are that child
The theatre stands unmanned
All the actors washing their sins
Up to their elbows in suds
He has taken his bike along fastest route
You met here before
Maybe you were twelve
The doorways are the same
The ship fronts have changed names
But still he smells of Autumn and old books
Still his large hand covers yours
And you are the child again
Running from the pain
Dazzled by the jewels of the city
Looking in windows
Seeing this time
Two reflections
When you broke my heart
Temporary
Rust.in.the.Soul 