Wonder

Very dark outside.

I’m on a standing train

by a window, wondering

how to write again,

when I pick up a book

by MacNeice

- a tatty paperback

and there’s an unknown poem about

‘a Window’ from half a century back.

This poem’s a moment

hanging in time and space -

and, if I could, I would talk

to him on alienation, I would mention

a window and how, outside, it’s dark

but light inside – how it is -

and how a train can go slow

until lights in the far, far distance

blur and pass, blur and pass;

wondering how we’d connect.

Death, ambition, even love

are not around – but moments

flashing. Each one unexpectant

like on a train, beyond a window.

So I pick up a pen

and I wonder.

Alive

Our family eats dinner, picks food;

Andrew nips away.

I hear the kitchen door begin to tremble

while Van-the-Man plays in stereo, digital,

but that’s not it.

Bursting through our kitchen door

a boy with trilby hat and walking stick,

diamond eyes, looks at himself in a mirror

and launches

a spinning rendition

of ‘The Old Bamboo’, jumping, partnering

a twirling stick.

We clap. He bows like Oscar Wilde,

grins and sits himself down to

a sideways glance, a smile, dinner.

Morning

body

tired and aching

a cauldron stirred by heat

and vertical blood pours up, up

spirit.

Being Alive

We went to the cinema

but the film was a ghoul;

Andrew sighed when characters

sighed, even snored

concurrently. In other

scenes he rose to sit on knees

and lean - mischievous boy and bored.

At its core, a family outing

propped like dominos

with popcorn, cola, tea;

no balance in an un-intense

and pointless movie fantasy:

with no emotion moving,

no tension in its plotting.

Around us heads like nodding dogs

in long straight lines. Some people

tried to tunnel something

out of nothing in a stare.

Andrew looks around and smiles with

glee - shouting as we leave

“I loved it. Yes, I loved it”

January

She’s a white queen with pretty feet of ice

on a year’s starting blocks, a cold killer,

consumpter, tragedy organizer

but she is also a clear and chique bride

who has scattered confetti on billions,

a new-child and a playful, gradual

enticer to light and daughter of wind,

howler and bellower in snowfull shapes,

bender of trees, isolator, thrasher,

tester of cowering blood-hot humans:

in awe of her strength we are forced inwards,

warmwards, to a log fire, hearth; each other.

A Gift of Downs

What if you thought you could sing

and could not lie,

were into people, not things,

weren’t shy,

never thought of pounds, pence,

wind or rain,

sported T-shirt, baggy pants,

were strange and plain

but knew that hearts can grow

by real degrees,

yes, by a touch, a smile, although

not everyone sees.

Love

When love hurtles

faster than a train on a rail

my heart flutters

and an unmade soul

(behind its veil)

races out for a tumble.

But when this train’s derailed, stopped

by mind, deft

as a sparking brake applied

right, screaming left,

love stirs and, governed by a brain adept,

stays safe and locked inside her iron depot.