Waiting

Waiting to see you but I'm so tired

My eyes shut shop, my brain expired

I'll leave a light on just in case

It wakes me up to see your face

I'll knock the pillow, 1-2-3

So my inner clock will chivvy me

But I slip to sleep and snooze alone

Snoring away when you get home

When I next prop my eyes ajar 

I raise my head and there you are

Good soup

The story starts with a stone

Smooth and salty

Locked by the sea

Pulled from the shore

Dropped in a pot

Filled from the stream

A carrot chopped

An onion skinned

A neighbour's leek

A turnip root 

Potatoes peeled

Garlic crushed

Brought to the boil

Sighing and slumping

As all gather round

Bowls clutched tight

Ladle by ladle

The pot grows thin

Until only the stone

Remains within

Different days

Ruining to the feast, my head aflame,

I'll slay their beast, I'll play their game, 

I'll drink their mead, I'll sing their songs, 

Say every creed, submerge to belong

But deep inside I'll keep the words

That I must hide, that can't be heard, 

That bring forth light, to banish shade,

To end the fight, for all I've prayed.

When the time comes, I close my eyes. 

A thousand suns burst into life

A thousand voices suddenly cease

A thousand choices, none lead to peace

Minor faults

The creep across my restless skull

Like a sensor net in a sci-fi film

Stealthy pin-pricks in the dark

Activating every nerve

The ringing in my ears that yet

Alarms me when in silent thought

Echoes of every past sound

Combined in quiet cacophony

The tingle tickling down my arm

So subtle in the day to day

Becomes a mashing nagging ache

That drives me from my restless bed

The many minor faults of age 

That magnify when least desired

Like weary friends that weigh us down

We carry them invisibly

Different days

It seems that everyone is out of sorts today,

Stress, illness, fatigue, ennui. 

Hard to keep on track, 

Hard to juggle contradictions, 

It's part of being

- parent, partner, colleague, confidante - 

Part of the everyday we all face 

Amaryllis

How big are the bees in South Africa

That such a flower should be required? 

A fatal explosion of blood-red shock

Mounted on a 3-foot green spire. 

I can only guess that on the Cape 

The wind must waltz in languid puffs 

Or else that tall top-heavy plant

Would be flattened on the bluffs. 

But I do agree its majesty

Is something full of flare

And as I'm passing through the house

I cannot help but stare. 

The magic hour

When two moons wane in the winter months and the sand is carved in clumps of frost, the galloping skink spreads its toes and thinks ahead to what was lost. Its bones absorb electron seeds and gather time between their cells, and with the carving of the sand, the moons are ripe for minor spells. A flicker of a twice-forked tongue, a tremble of a twisted claw, the skink removes its final breath and cranes to hear what it saw. In bare whispers faint as dusk a future tale as old as life, as true as the sun winding its eye as true as the winter wielding its knife. 'Wait and watch until it comes, wait to see its eyelids crack, catch the colour in your hand, then turn and ruin and don't look back'. And shivering, the skink returns to re-inhale its final breath, sets its face against the wind and waits to catch the eye of death. 

Eclipsed

I saw it, half a bite

    And nothing more

And then, a stuttered snore

    From the bed behind

Asked if I had lost my mind

To be up at half past four 

I chose to decline

    A moonlit fight

Calling it a night

    For the best, I'm sure

But my heart was sore

Aching for another sight

No way back

No way back from the snap of the trap

Or the tallow on the arrow aflame by the match

Or the slip spit spikes sprinkled beneath

Or the viridian viper's venomous teeth

The light

It's flashing a message

Long - short - short

Is it Morse code? 

Perhaps a Napoleonic cipher?

It blinks as I think. 

What does it want? 

I go to my day,

Red message son forgotten, 

But like a tree in the forest, 

Does it still call? 

Breath

Every day at twenty-past seven

I open the door and taste the air

Fill my lungs as the wind passes

And seize the riches hidden there

Every breath a call to adventure

Every scent a promise of more

Yet every day at seven twenty-one

I turn my back and close the door

Icumen In

It's in the hum of the bees

In the glittering thread of spider silk

It's in the beat of the wing 

In the gloss of the emerald leaf

It's in the creak of wood

In the scatter of the scurrying ant

It's in the up-thrust earth

In the bustling beetle claws

It's in the pink of the buds 

In the glare of the window glass

It's in the scent of the spring

In the crunch of the ice cream cone

It's in the red of my skin

In my leaving and returning home

Coming apart

I'm coming apart at the seams

I no longer know what it means to be human

I'm crumbling into dust

I don't know how but I must hold together

I'm questioning who I am

The face in the mirror a sham great pretender

I'm holding myself for the count

But no matter how high the amount it's not enough

I'm tired and I'm ready to sleep

Maybe tomorrow I'll keep a day longer

I'm living but not for myself

Saving up all of my health for another

interrobang

Punctuation did not appear

Fully formed upon the page

It evolved like any glyph

Through the years from age to age

I refer you to the question mark

An abbreviated 'Q' and 'O' 

Short for 'quaestio' or 'what' 

To show something you did not know

The exclamation mark, or bang

Had a similar 'mode d'emploi'

Formed from the letters 'I' and 'O' 

From 'io' the Latin word for 'joy' 

l'Oignon

I do not understand quite how

The first human pulling the plough

And turning over an onion root 

Decided it was a tasty fruit

On biting first the papery skin

And remarking that wasn't where to begin

They proceeded then to slice the sphere

And started crying from ear to ear

As their salty tears fell down

They wondered what they'd dragged from the ground

This hellish food that caused such pain

That made their eyelids fill with rain

And so to get revenge on it

They lit a fire and grabbed a spit 

Roasted it to an inch of its life

Attacked it with a handy knife

Scooped it up and took a bite

And thought... Actually, it's alright! 

Homeless

It had been in the family for generations

Generations of generations born in these towers

Re-lined with yearly moss

Feathers fluffed, eggs sheltered

Celebrated shrieks and wheels

When cracks widened, as did mouths

First flights from pot to tile

Cautious steps to life-long loves 

Title passed from wing to wing

Until it wasn't

80 years of unbroken lives ended

Bricks removed, last traces smoothed

And all they have is shared grief and disbelief

As they cry at unknown tomorrows

Pancakes

Starburst in a frying pan

Batter shaped and shifting pale 

A vigorous shake to shift then flip

And fly through stretching seconds 

Apex achieved, descending now

Until a used napkin lines the pan

All folds and failure 

Teased apart to try again

St. Ives

As I was going to St. Ives

I met a man lived 7 lives

Each life was lived in joy

3 a girl and 4 a boy 

7 ages young and old

7 secrets never told

14 eyes and 14 hands

14 tales from foreign lands

All of these rolled into one

And now my St. Ives tale is done

Long nights

Who are they?

The people in my dreams with their faces melting

Every one not quite right

Pinched or swollen

Laughing or staring as if to say

You know me, you are part of me

This slipping skin is yours and mine

You've seen me, caught my gorgon's gaze

I'm here, you'll never sleep alone

Alone, you'll never sleep for fear

That in the dark my hands will creep

And crawl along your night-drenched skin

And pry your eyelids wide apart

And slip my blackened fingers in 

Spring!

There's something in the air

   It's not just the first bees drunkenly swaying

   Through the first flowers brazenly splaying

There's something in the air

There's a warmth on the wind

   You can feel your skin gently glowing

   You can hear the plants greedily growing

There's a warmth on the wind

Spring! The birds cry

Spring! The blue sky

Spring! The branches creak

Spring! The earth speaks

How do you do it?

To the boy who

Every day tracks an app

To tell him when to take a needle

And rebalance his blood

To the girl who

Bleeds for the first time

And knows that every month

This will be her pain

I don't know how

You are so strong

To take your fate

And change the shape

Of who you are

Psiome

And so it's complete

From alphabet to psiome

26 creation myths

The chicken and egg of language 

Words become letters

Letters become words

Layer upon layer of forgotten codes

Initiates and secret signs

Until like so many things

They pass from magic to mundane