Poems

a day at the beach

we spent that day at the beach:
my kids trying to catch the sun
trapped in the water

lying on a blanket
I entertained myself
by digging in the sand

the hole was shallow
like a begging hand
it didn’t hold much:
a few tiny stones with an unfamiliar shape

then I dug out a cigarette
precious cigarette
and a cheap petrol lighter
I remembered them well

I continued to remove the sand
with each handful
fine grains nested deeper
under fingernails

I found pieces of jewelry
lost years ago
old phone
and the book with my notes

I dug quickly like a dog
when I found a hair:
I first pulled out my old friend
then a girl

I uncovered a house
with a garden
and old tram-tracks
I finally reached the bottom

I saw an old man
sitting on a rock
smiling sadly he said
time is a place

the house is not quiet

when my kids finally
fall asleep
the house appears quiet and still

except it’s not
when I sit I hear the movement of the walls
cracking sounds in the ceiling –
is someone tip-toeing
through the dark rooms?

wood groans,
pipes expand and contract
the wind presses against the windows
fills the chimney with sad whispers
everything decays and declines
secretly, persistently

there can’t be any stillness
in this world

when my kids finally
fall asleep I sit
I am quiet and still

damn continuity

the past is gone
the future is yet to come
and the present just slipped away
yet we manage to evolve (or regress)

what if there is no time at all?
(ask Parmenides or Julian Barbour from Banbury, Platonia)
every moment exists simultaneously
like photos
pinned to an endless wall

and what we call time
is like crossing illusory bridges

or maybe
as conservatives would say
all was created by almighty Jack
at the beginning of time

(but if time has a beginning
then a woman can give birth to her own mother)

or maybe time is solid
and we could go back
digging through the layers

we won’t know more
than an impression of continuity

why would the Universe
speak our language?

rain doesn’t bother me

rain does not
bother me
when I’m roaming those
muddy country roads
that stretch forever

each drop
is a cold reminder
this is real
this is real
this is real

and yet
no more real
than a kinetoscopic record
of a long lost summer
viewed through the peephole
of memory

sitting in a cold dark room

sitting in a cold dark room
7 am Sunday morning
being open
present in the body
that is as vast as space

it turns out

when the time is an illusion
there is no more waiting

I suddenly hear
my 6 yo son upstairs
shouting at his toys
groaning  like a wounded batman
mumbling to himself

I’m trying not to laugh
I’m trying not to laugh

men die sooner

on grandfather’s day
we have nobody to call to

men die earlier apparently
– because of all the hard work they did, I said
– rather all the booze and smokes, she said
but isn’t it all the same?

uninspiring conversations
cold sharp edges of things
pissing contest
unkind looks
like precise kicks
as if all this was real

at the end of the day
we all wait to pass out
by whatever means necessary