Moving

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Moving

(for BKB)

Our kitchen clock has ticked,
time to pack up,
time to clear out,
cardboard boxes,
still life on the living room floor.
A full-stop.
Another paragraph written.

This house has done its work.
Candles burnt.
We were here,
a joint composition,
major and minor keys,
melody,
atonality,
dissonance,
harmony.
Unfinished symphony.

More than poetry.
Infinity of haiku
silent rooms between
characters.
On this stage,
we voiced parts,
fashioned scripts,
co-authors.

I’ve written my way through this house,
stepped beyond the deck,
out into a backyard
to trees and stream
underneath snow.
(Memories in parentheses)
Our kitchen, hearth of home,
chairs, a shrunken table,
furniture that made space grow.

Chicken noodle soup from a can,
potato chips,
grapes,
milk from a carton,
silver spoons,
our last supper.
I don’t know where we’ll eat tomorrow.

Never known the next phrase,
the sentence to come,
the chapter after this,
the story’s conclusion.

Like a hummingbird’s nest,
where we eat, drink, love, grow, sing,
shall we weave together twigs,
plant fibers,
bits of larch leaves,
shall we thread spider silk to bind our nest
together
and anchor
to another forked branch.

The Seaweed Lorry

 

The seaweed lorry

How long have I driven a seaweed lorry to Roundstone
past fuchsia and montbretia?
How long has the wife practised acupuncture,
the daughter dried dulse?
You’d wonder as you pitchfork the algae,
watch strips slip off, litter the lane.

They can take their time,
wait their turn to pass,
I have many more journeys in me,
many more days leading hearse and caravan.
They can all take their turn,
why should they pass?

I’ve driven this way too long now to be forced off it,
seen their urgent béasa,
refused to be edged off my bóthar.
There were houses full
– not enough rooms for the children –
before there weren’t children for the rooms.

I’ve seen them all off,
I’ve still gone back for more seaweed.

_________________________

Image by Jonathan Wilkins