First Light

 

I am waiting in the car

It is early

And it is cold

The vents breathe lukewarm air

Against the frozen windows

A patch of clear glass is slowly revealing itself

Through the ice and condensation

The radio is on, but quietly

The burble of noise, 

Fades in and out of the remnants of dreams

Nibbles at the edges of my waking mind

As the warming air gently erodes

The borders of frost on the windscreen

Streetlights and amber houses

Glow gently through 

This dissolving glacier

This ice white cocoon

Fractal diamonds

Crumbling to reveal the world

I like the slowness of this

The gentle changing of states

Watching the frontiers of Winter weaken and fade

Silver crystals soften and drift

And melt away

I hear the muffled thump of the house front door

In moments you will be here

I turn the heater up full

Warmth crawls swiftly across the remains

Of this melting battlefield

Fingers of heat spread out

Tearing apart the last of the night

Footsteps approach

You open the car door

And my day begins

Cesare Lombroso

 

My name is Cesare Lombroso

And I have something to say

You have bumps on your head

And they won’t go away

And it’s bad news for you

‘Cause to me they’re a sign

That your key disposition

Is inclined towards crime

I can feel, if I stroke them

The shapes that are formed

When you let bad ideas

Wander into your thoughts

I explain criminality 

Through the wisdom of phrenology

Like a word makes much more sense

When you know it’s etymology

My contention is this:

People vile, wrong and predatory

Can be traced through their genes 

Wickedness is hereditary

I’m Cesare Lombroso

Don’t wear my name out

For my science will make me 

A man of renown

I identify vagabonds, 

Ruffians and thieves

With my map of the scalp

Where a lump or a crease

Is a sure sign of villainy

Of virtue defective

My fingers are like 

The world’s greatest detective!

I’ll teach you to judge 

With the eyes, not the mind

My determinist credo 

Might be cruel and unkind

And borderline fascist, I guess,

If it’s racist

To judge people’s souls

By the look of their faces

But it’s easier, you see

To judge moral intent

By observing your arms

And assessing their length

Cesare Lombroso

Just let that name ring

Of knee jerk injustice

I’m surely the king

My science is wonky

My methods unsound

But the echoes of my

Flawed conclusions resound

And it makes me feel good

That a hundred years on

My discredited thoughts

Will find comfort and home

In the minds of a tribe who

Should be more reflective

Who should know that rapscallions

Can’t be detected

By the texture of skin

Or the length of the neck

Who should trust in psychology

Appreciate context

But instead put their trust

In my glorious name

Cesare Lombroso

It’s not the bumps on your head

It’s who you choose to believe That’s to blame

Looking For Sticks

Let’s go looking for sticks!

Let’s go looking.

For sticks!

If anyone asks we’ll pretend that we’re kids

We’ll say, “We’re just nine year olds, 

To whom nothing is barred, and

I think you’ll find, that’s what 

We’re doing in your garden.”

We kids can go anywhere

That’s one of the rules

And… he’s calling the cops….

He’s not so easily fooled

There’s no joy for us here

He’s seen through our disguise

He knows that we’re really two middle aged guys

Our quest for some sticks must continue elsewhere

And it’s odd, when you’re older

How people will stare

As you crawl on the ground, examining twigs

Discarding them, mostly, for not being so big

I want one that’s special, and bendy, and strange

I just want to hold it, I just want to play

With a branch that could work as a gun or a sword

A stick that I can, for no reason, adore

Let’s run through the fields and the snickets and yards

Let’s get dirt on our faces

And stay out ‘til it’s dark

Let’s go looking for sticks

And lose track of the day

And then, when it’s hometime

Let’s throw them away

There’ll be more sticks tomorrow

It’s the searching that’s good

Let’s keep looking, forever

For those beautiful fragments of wood

Lopsided

I have, of late, become uneven

Physically, I think

There’s disparity in the way I move

My arms, the way I 

Smile, the way I blink

I’m lopsided, 

Non-perpendicular

An asymmetrical reponse

To matters regular and peculiar

I peer into mirrors

Pestering them to reveal

The nature of the imbalance I perceive

And they would know, 

Mirrors

Being, by nature, creatures of

Exacting synchronicity

But when I twist 

And flux 

And stretch

Hoping to catch 

A vagary in performance

In the version of myself the glass reflects

The mirror fails to report

Any such infraction

Right is left

And left is right

If there’s a difference,
I can’t catch one

Except, perhaps

A growing schism

Between the fractured lines 

Of the old man’s face reflected

And the younger looks

And brighter eyes

My foolish, naive heart

Expected

Unexplored Continents

Colours on my fingernails

Juniper blue and Christmas red

Painted by you, as the fire mutters and cracks

And the Winter sky holds the promise of snow

The lights on the tree blossom

As the room grows dark around us

My fingers spread, my hands still

The varnish glistens

Settles and holds me

I am transformed and wonder

At these tiny, fingertip maps of different worlds

Flame and fairy lights reflected in my nails

Here on this December night

Days later

At home

The paint is chipped

And scuffed and worn

The smooth cartography of your work fragmented

To reveal rough shapes

Unexplored continents

Diminishing fragments that I pick slowly apart

Soon the crimson fire and indigo night skies are gone

Leaving the clear, empty canvas

Of my unvarnished nails

Of this new year