Threads bind

the city, weave

memory’s path.

 

Your face lost

in tourist crowd,

year’s flow

 

like muddy river.

 

I’m fossilized in

a myth: image

in glass

 

emanates

time’s

distortion.

 

‘’I’’ become

a stranger:

soul weeps

 

There is no

cleansing,

no panacea

 

to restore

the

obscure.

 

You talk, talk,

talk, dreams

down optic fibre

 

phantom shakes

hidden weft,

grabs at

 

snagged thread:

 

& pulls.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Kandinsky

to Leonardo

this city sweats

genius.

 

But today

I’m obsessed

by hair colour

leg length, accent:

 

the girls swirl

across cracked

paving like

new morning.

 

Each one

breathes hope

into lover’s ear;

I’m adrift in

 

sunlight.

 

This city seeps

genius: dead busts

stare bronze

to copper

 

generations

tumble,

left

nameless.

 

Only the men

march on:

dicks at

attention.

 

 

Listen here

 

 

 

I’m cloud filled

jet rises, you return

as always: a phantom

buoying me up.

 

I rely on your

insentient presence

it gets emotional

touching strata

 

remembering us.

 

This is economy

no stream lined

left turn blasé

white napkin

 

for your daughter now.

 

I relinquish hold

as turbulence

bounces: if I

died up here

 

at least you’d

find pieces

of me

drifting.

 

Cloud filled

you slip through

my fingers: I wait

for your face

 

to haunt me.

 

 

Listen here 

 

I’m chasing footsteps

through my mind

 

where time shifts

blind alley

 

& twenty years

is but a kiss,

 

a touch, a murmured

slip, of who we are.

 

This acid spring

has cut my heart

 

in strips:

 

it’s pumping blossom

all my blood drained

 

& bagged.

 

Your hands are

searching

 

for a grip, it tips

me into sleep.

 

I’m chasing shadows’

where we hide

 

on threshold not yet

crossed, & everything

 

looks grey through

telescopic lens

 

of age:

 

it creeps into my

bones; slowing impulse

 

stifling change.

 

Yes, I’m chasing

footprints in my mind

 

I reach for you

 

your softness slips

between my fingers

 

like this life:

this life all mine.

 

(Listen here.)

 

The swallows’ think

it’s Spring, & blossom

 

clusters white

from leafless tree;

 

Sun trembles on the

lip of dawn, kisses

 

earth’s sweet opening,

tastes colour:

 

Tulip flouts her

orange head,

 

swallows’ think

it’s Spring

 

& I should too.