Your Kitchen

The stove is warm against my back

A scatter of branches 

Divides up the white sky outside

Photos of you, me, everyone, 

On the fridge, looking out,

Smiling at our future selves

Connected across time

And the heat of the stove

A heart, pumping out into this house

Its warmth uncurling through hallways

And dark rooms

Through the days and months of my year

So I can feel it now, 

Six months and 200 miles away

And in every shadow I can see

The amber glow of those days

Feeding the fire to keep it alive

The embers flicker, faint and nearly gone

I blow gently, to prolong the glow

Charcoal sketches in the creases of my hand

Birds in the branches

The stove against my back

Warming me, 

Until I’m there again

 

Some Things Burn Forever

 

The sun went down a little while ago

But pale, amber light still washes the sky,

Simmers on the walls of the bedroom.

It is past my bedtime, but I don’t want

To stop reading

So I huddle on the carpet, back to the window

Eyes gently tugging against the darkening pages

Eking out the last of the Summer day

So I can stay

With the hitchhikers and Cybermen

And witches cats and I’m not ready yet

For them to go away

It doesn’t feel like night, more

A hidden, secret part of the day.

An hour than opens and unfolds

A place that’s warm

And safe

The rooftops slope, diagonal, past the dormer window

Humming warm with the echoes of the sun

I read until the words are gone

Homogeneous Prometheus

 

Inspired by nothing more than optimism

Bill set out into the morning

To see if there was any magic

He thought it was probably there, in abundance

But most people missed it

Most people weren’t looking

Bill would not miss it

Bill would look at the world in a different way

A new way.

You know what?

I hate Bill. 

I already, definitely, hate Bill. 

I’m sorry. I know I just created him. 

I know I just created you, Bill

But you’re terrible

Bouncing out of your door like you’re in a cartoon

Or an advert for… I don’t know what

Waffles, or car insurance or fascism

Or something

Looking for magic? Seriously?

Were you going to follow your heart?

Search for truth in the dreams told by the clouds in the sky?

Have an original thought, Bill.

I feel I may have crushed Bill’s optimism somewhat.

And now I feel bad.

I’m sorry, Bill

It’s not your fault

It’s mine

It’s my fault

For making you so awful. 

Look. Maybe there is some magic. 

Over there. In that puddle. 

Most people wouldn’t look there, 

Would they, Bill?

In a puddle. They’d avoid it. 

But not you.  

Because you, Bill, you see things differently.

Go on. Look in the puddle. 

What’s reflected?

Nothing, Bill. 

Nothing is reflected.

Just your stupid, weird nosed face. 

Oh, yeah. I forgot to say. 

You have a really weird nose. 

Stay on Target

 

Close your eyes and let it drift away

It’s OK if now and then

We don’t create an epic story with our day

If we say fewer words to one another

Than Schwarzenegger in the original Terminator

If our interior worlds remain unsaid

If, sometimes, when the light goes off

You just need to sink forever into bed

If the most romantic thing I’ve said all day

Is “I got you a biscuit,

Because I was getting myself a biscuit

But if you don’t want it, I’ll have it.”

Our silence as we stare at our phones

If this were a play

Would be a telling tableau of a relationship

With all the colour drained

But days like these are echoes, not of disaster

But of a song that’s always there

If you know how to listen

Of days when the course is set and strong and good

And I need nothing more than you

In my peripheral vision