Shorties

From the other side of the wall

Like iron filings to a magnet, fingerprints cling to matchsticks

as you flick them curving inside a cold cathedral.

The glow dies out before hitting dry bricks

and you lose all hope of illumination.

But in the huge echoed empty I feel you murmur

and you’re no further away than you ever were.

West

On a clear day I can see home from here,

if I climb high enough –

or I’ll inhale the pennies from the river bed

every time I’m low enough.

The ever shifting copper sings me out of here,

rattling through my hair

like rickety fingers running through,

always pointing West.

Sometimes the night belongs to me,

like poppies spreading themselves

against a backdrop swollen blue –

red gone to sunburnt rust –

the creaking furniture,

paint flecked,

filling Summer’s first garage.

Being Quiet

It was Winter when you moved in –

3 am would stick in my throat

like it was my very own

and the roads were all resistant.

You had every reason to be real to me

and I wanted to be quiet without distance.