A Moment

You high-jacked the moment
with questions.
Your hand on his,
a lover's hold
thumbs caressing
soothing away the world.

But your eyes
checking as I pass
en route to my moment
drew me
to seek your identity
to ask questions
that intruded
on the security of your moment.

One car in the car park
on my arrival.
Two houses on your returns-
this your brief moment
to sustain hope
and remember passion.

Or
are you late to love
dumbstruck at its depth
the silence of love?


Incredulous
that at mid life
mid family
you hold hands
across a table
still tender.

I accuse falsely?
I intruded?
My void
captivated.
Jealously and longing
echoing across my heart.


(2006)
(An escape to quiet coffee stop one Sunday morning, to do some reading. Never saw them again. Never got any work done either! Too many questions.)

A Favourite Opening

"Once upon a time,
there was a woman
who discovered
she had turned
into the wrong woman"

(The opening lines of
Back When We Were Grown-ups
by Anne Tyler)

Sometimes I can't get past the open lines of a book. It took five attempts to get past Hardy's wonderful depiction of dawn on Egdon Heath.

Before Autumn.

What is a leaf in a forest
should it decide
to sever its stem
and plummet
to seek the peace
of forest bed?
Quickly decay,
not slowly.

To surrender its green
before autumn
claims its ground,
sets its time.

No tree will weep to lose a leaf
so near the end.
Its place
soon taken
by fresh shoot
and optimistic shades.

No one counts the leaves in a forest.

(2005)
(My drive to work is long, takes me through forest, past viewpoints, by lochs and woods, and sometimes can feel lonely. This melancholic piece reflects one of those days. I've never wanted to edit its roughness.)