Meeting Point

How

a fleeting glance

is a chance

for romance.

How

a weighty word,

profound, absurd,

flies like a bird

but

reaching hands

have much

more chance

for a song

and dance.

A real Down's question

Hiding’s not possible when he decides

to talk to you; to ask a question like

‘have you a beard?’:- and everything falls still,

or ‘Are you mad?’:- and you pause in the void,

or ‘are you bovvered?’:- and silence abounds

catching your breath because spotlights are on

and you might say the wrong thing:

bearded or bovvered or mad – Well??

And it’s ridiculous how quickly you blush

just because it’s not so easy to answer

routinely. Behind the question

lies a sly question, a poke

bringing you live to connection, ‘can you connect?’

and there’s a boy laughing and doing his work.

In Scotland, February

light is glimpsing out from its winter shell,

spreading brightness as a trapdoor falls.

It’s 5.15 pm in a snowy Tuesday

gloaming that is diligent and tender.

Trash is piled beneath empty train seats

and, outside, a river turns West to salt.

Birds and wind drop to quiet evening sun

and, on, our train plunges into a tunnel

blacker than a night has ever known

but knowing, also, light advances, grows.

Leadership

If Leadership is

about the best decisions

who decided that?

February

A man and wife hold hands

sitting on the left side of a moving train.

They seem in love - though that kind of thing

is hard to know

because, in February, snow melts and freezes, melts

and, as we hammer North, their bodies

vibrate; little hands

and eyes connecting where the warmth is.