It is as though you split me off
somewhere at the edge of your awareness,
yet still close to your heart,
like a dear, old relation in a coma
living on life support.
You whisper things in his ear
you’d never tell him to his face;
you bring flowers for his sill,
and at Christmas—a tree.
You weep when he isn’t there
to cheer you at the race,
and one day,
when I’m gone,
you’ll pen a glowing eulogy.
May 17
May 17, 2026 at 5:02 AM UTC
An Amazon running through the wood.
She glides along the weft and wend
and leaps the waters black as soot,
while, after and before, there comes
a golden hound, bemuddied and unbound,
amidst the racket and the croak
of every frog and toad.
A man, wandering through the wood.
He questions as he goes:
Who yearns?
Who aches to say, “Hello?”
Who wonders—
“How pretty are her hands? Her feet?”
“How sweet would be the sound?”
Stark, the moon stares.
Birds nestle in the gloom.
Full of eyes: the silent cliffs.
She trips and falls so near to him,
he hears the groan come out of her.
Are you okay?
“Are… you OK?”
Too stunned, she cannot say.
But he can only stand and stare,
destined to refrain:
“Are you OK?”
How sweet the anguish
carried on that strain
that brings her to her feet again,
while at her side a cherub of a sort
lays muddy licks upon her hand.
An Amazon running through the wood.
Questions in the dark.
Stark, the moon stares.
Birds nestle in the gloom.
Full of eyes: the silent cliffs.
Leaves beneath his feet.
May 16
May 16, 2026 at 5:38 AM UTC
I love what you see
when I look in your eyes,
eyes so bright and shining,
eyes that melt so tenderly
at the one who looks but cannot see.
It is a look I’ve seen before,
a look once seen in eyes like yours—
before the subject of the fall
had taken any shape or form,
before ever I was me.
Something tightens as it loosens
seeing your eyes on me,
when we stand in the sun together
under the shady tree;
yet, your avid eyes remind me
that there must be more to see
than this phantom in the mirror
given shape by memory.
It is a look I’ve seen before,
a look once seen in eyes like yours—
before the time of oath and vow,
burned in the furnace of your here and now.
I would risk a second longer in your spell,
leap off the firm and fallow ground,
rebel against that shrinking silhouette—
that old refrain of sorrow and regret—
and catch you breathless in a sigh;
take the keys of Eden in your eyes
and through the razing flames of folly run,
mouth-to-mouth, hand-in-hand,
forget to understand,
and disappear for just one second long.
Oh, what became of the shady tree
and the lovely girl who looked at me,
whose eyes, immortalised in memory,
revealed the self I could not see?
I cannot bear to drive that way,
though she long left—and who can say
who’s looking in those lovely eyes
that open onto paradise?
It is a look I’ve seen before,
a look once seen in eyes like yours—
but for a folly and a come-what-may,
I’ve kept my faith in yesterday.
May 15
May 15, 2026 at 3:40 AM UTC
Oh, squirrel,
with your pretty paws
and ink-black claws
and eyes of quiet radiance,
you wait as in a trance—
or is it hesitance?
Perchance it is a squirrel’s certainty
that keeps you in the bowers of your tree,
with an acorn cradled in your arms.
Or yet,
is it a thorny penitence
that keeps that acorn for your sins?
Patience, patience… could it be?
The well-trod commerce of civility?
Or is it but a force of will
that, in a look, defiantly,
insists: “You come to me!”
… and yet, you hold that nut
so tightly in your fists.
In the shady garden green
there are many paths unseen,
where, quite by chance—as in a dream—
we meet,
as moon shadows on a silent street,
with nothing in our pockets
and echoes at our feet.
There stands a statue
washed in alabaster light,
half-alive with strange delight,
or is it scorn,
unburdened by an ancient spite?
But when I watch your placid face,
though your heart may race—
no tail dissembles with a swish,
no whisker trembles
with a whisper from your lips.
My heart is like a raging sea;
it tosses ship and ballast free,
and what it wills, I cannot sense or see—
while your spry heart is such a rare device
of delicate telemetry.
But when I spy you there beneath your tree,
and our eyes meet,
there is a secret solace that responds,
that stirs the roaring breakers from their bonds,
though they will never reach your feet.
May 13
May 13, 2026 at 3:40 AM UTC
The toasted sourdough lands hot in my fingers,
lifts itself up with my hands,
taking me up to my senses
where heat meets skin
and air breathes in.
How strange:
who celebrates the glory of life?
Images compete.
Reflections in a mirror.
Mere words: second hand, third hand.
A knife and butter,
honey oozing from a ***
crisp, hot, soft, then yeastly sweet,
salty and sour till all that’s left is an echo of heat,
of buttered toast between my fingers.
Two dogs beckoning at my feet.
Images compete.
Mere words.
Second hand.
Third hand.
Reflections in a mirror.
May 12
May 12, 2026 at 4:28 AM UTC
I thought life would be silent with you,
that our days and hours would be filled
with the quiet accord of love.
Book-quiet at night,
we would sit in the alcove of your window,
silently,
and watch the rain trickle down the glass.
When a car whooshed past on the street below,
a light would flare up—
white and brilliant,
then scarlet red,
running along the rivulets.
I fell in love with the promise of that quiet bliss,
filled to the brim with emptiness.
But here, below,
all is gnawing noise and breathless air
and a sallow hope caught in the restless
thoroughfare of thought.
Who pined for you till the isthmus between my ribs
was swallowed up with bile?
Was it love that sought its exodus
in the shuttered casements of your eyes?
At whose behest did I kiss the lids of Lazarus?
How I have longed for the absolution
of those quiet eyes,
standing on the station waiting for your train,
and a long, quiet ride through still valleys
and deep-rooted mountains.
Yet always am I pursued by that departing view,
or hemmed in by an ever-narrowing horizon;
and between the two, a hollow silence—
gagging itself with its fist.
If only I could come to silence
from a choice that was not made of noise—
true silence,
brimming over with emptiness,
chiming up with silver bells
on the heels of a quiet spring,
like the silver bracelets jangling on your ankles
leading me to your bed again.
May 11
May 11, 2026 at 3:55 AM UTC
You, who created me,
came with me;
but when we made our God
I left mine at a view
where a sudden ravine
fell upon plodding harvest fields,
admiring the blue —
where three white clouds scudded on a breeze
and an eagle towered, so still and black,
stretched on leafy sinew.
Once, I left mine in the shine
of a new pair of boots,
forgot mine in the eyes
of an almond-eyed girl,
lost mine in the muck of a coffee cup
rattling on to a far-off port of call.
May 10
May 10, 2026 at 4:10 AM UTC
While I watch the falling leaves,
hypnotised,
you make a Nespresso.
Opening each new sleeve
feels like a gift, you tell me
— like unwrapping a box of cigarettes.
The coloured cartridges are so Christmassy,
you could tassel them on a tree.
The coffee never tastes like much,
but you get used to coffee that tastes like tea.
The low hum of the espresso machine
is hypnotising;
so too, the soothing cadence
of the news on TV
— that once would have played
on the kitchen radio
when I could still snake a figure-eight
between Mum and Dad’s knees.
But now it’s just you and me,
waltzing in the shelter of
our routine.
Driving through the rain to work,
the car still smells fresh from two days ago,
when we went for our Saturday morning excursion:
a car wash and eggs Benedict.
Saturday used to carry the promise
of eternity for me,
playing Space Invaders all day
at the back of a dingy café.
Worst was trundling up the contour path
to the reservoirs on top of Table Mountain,
rucksacks stuffed with ham sandwiches
and zoo biscuits, and Mum plying us
with a thermos of hot milky tea.
As thunder grumbled down the cliffs
and up the galleries, we’d complain
about missing this or that on TV—
while I dreamed of getting home
to my shiny red cricket ball,
whose crisp white seam
would saw through the air like a bumblebee.
At work, it is a marvel to watch
how my hands do their own bidding,
while I wander lost in the snowdrift
outside the window
— feeling its smothering comfort
like the silk-soft pillows of your lips
last Sunday morning,
unwrapping me with coaxing kisses,
your hands, worshipful,
your head bowed as though I were some
Levitican idol
— taking me deep into the forbidden heart
of your chant.
But you release me
like some dream-addled Pan,
roused from his reverie
to find you lying beside me,
half-wrapped in your shawl,
your feet treading the air
like two white doves,
oblivious before the hawk.
The talk in the office smells like a dead rat to me,
but after a long day, home feels like
a quiet country church
— the kind converted to a hostelry.
And later, as we sit on the couch
admiring our new TV, that chatters
matter-of-fact-checked like a Bible,
we both agree that it’s all a hoax,
dissembled from a cereal box,
and we congratulate ourselves on our survival.
But as I wrap you up in bed at night,
and I feel you tied to me
like a ribbon fastened tight,
the sorrow and despair of our sly grift
takes comfort in tomorrow:
yet another unopened gift.
May 9
May 9, 2026 at 3:02 AM UTC
Monday to Friday,
I survive;
Saturday, Sunday,
I revive.
On Friday nights I swill and scoff
while people in the ghetto starve—
holy for the things they lack,
while I’ll be ******
I paint things black.
On Sunday, straining in the pew,
I wish I could confess to you
to something more than this:
the privilege of my loneliness,
admit to some anointed perfidy,
hitch up the silk-sleeved
grievances of Arcady,
and meet you down on hand and knee.
The ghetto wives are soft as lard,
the ghetto men are hard and fierce
with righteous fury,
absolved by every judge and jury,
paraded on the streets
of long-dead men,
upon whose plinths
they pose and preen
or mock with spit
the remnants of the fall
gleaming on the subway wall.
From my window
I can see
a steeple clambering through the gloom—
each morning with the same resolve
it rises up and presses on,
faithful to its master’s call.
And yet,
it falters in a noose of stars,
caught in the jaws of a crescent moon.
While here below I douse with tears
my petty doubts and paltry fears,
and pledge with scotch
the loves I’ve lost,
effete and out-of-touch.
Through eyes of sullen stone
they stare,
new pantheon for an old despair
whose rites exhort from snarling lips
a terrible benevolence.
In rage-red robes
they haunt the bridge
above the chasm and the void
to guide the children left behind—
its rainbow pennons whipping in the wind—
that all might be redeemed,
that none might be denied.
Yet here below,
I curse my eyes their enmity
for all the crimes I would not see,
and worse,
that ancient enemy,
ascended into paradise:
homunculus,
scion of dust,
rib of Eve,
mothered at the breast of men
whose saltless tears
confess before its cloven feet,
who gathers in its crook
the children
of those rook-tined hills,
that each might be redeemed,
that none is left behind—
while their Silent City watches on,
all become
as strangers to themselves.
Sunday piles high with dread
while Monday dares not draw the drapes;
at night, I cook with wine from sour grapes
and scrape the mould from Friday’s bread.
Tuesday’s slow malaise
takes me deeper down below,
safe in the certainty of all I know—
while jewels of dancing ice
toll sweetly in the glass,
regale my lightless eyes
while Mozart murmurs on the gramophone.
Oh, Wednesday drives me to the edge of shame,
till Thursday beats its slow retreat
and Friday comes around again.
May 8
May 8, 2026 at 3:28 AM UTC
Looking back at you in the mirror,
I think I look pretty handsome
standing there in
your new blue puffer jacket.
I think she would find him very handsome too—
looking like this,
she might just give me back a few inches
after she all but lost interest in loving you.
There is something of a dignified shade of grey:
his beard, a noble lichen
growing on a soft-skinned birch.
Your hair looks dark and rich,
not that mousy brown
of rabbits and rodents,
and who will know
it’s all because you haven’t washed in three days?
I put patchouli under your arms;
patchouli and 3-day-aged,
air-dried sweat mix well,
and everyone comments
on how wonderful you smell!
Keeping down appearances,
the cracks show,
and I see you wonder how many people know.
But we still look forward to Friday nights—
with our burrata,
vine-ripened oxheart tomato and oregano,
and a soft-pillowed pie
of cheesy, chewy una Napoletana
brought back
bubbling on the pizza stone
— three minutes after his clapped-out Beetle
drove off smelling of stale sweat and diesel.
My washing machine
froths and foams, just like the ocean.
Ruminates behind its oversized viewing window,
filling up the kitchen with the smell of ozone,
dissolving everything back to itself.
Living here with you,
you wonder how to solve
the problem of me—
but I know it’s you I must dissolve,
bringing our thoughts back to themselves,
and I back to
I… don’t… know… who.
At least we both agree
on your ridiculous belly,
****** in corset-tight
until he forgets and it all falls out!
But when I look at you in the mirror,
I see your shame—
how did that lithe, lean boy
end up this way?
He’s tired of holding up the torch,
but I remind him that even Buddha
had a paunch!
But, as you say,
his appetite was for truth,
not Friday nights holed up
and hidden away
with a bowl of unctuous, oozy cacio e pepe
and a glass or two of long-cellared Cabernet.
Through the window, the ocean rolls,
erasing every vice and sin
and all those virtues in disguise,
but last to go before the rinse and spin
is this conviction in
the fiction of you and me:
a flare bursting out of the abyss
that frames a figure in the mist,
a spasm and a fear—
yet, every time I turn around
there’s no one there…
Empty and opened wide,
we mingle with the surf and spray
that lays its cheek upon the strand,
dragging up its foamy frock
to tiptoe back and forth—
with no one to become
and nothing to be done—
just the dunes rolling on and on
beneath a moon’s faint hand.
In the warm night air,
lizards lick beneath its lids
or flee the rasping voice of gorse that
grasps the wind within its claws.
The tangled roots of mountains
groan in the solemn languages of stone,
where purple fists of amethyst
await the light in infinite quiet.
Freshet and stream whisper in the
silk-soft cant of silt,
yet I,
blind and mute,
deaf to silence,
heir and author of disgrace,
remember you in my amnesia,
ancient of days!—
in your new blue puffer jacket
with carbonara on its collar,
brought back beaming
as though there had never been another—
a loving hand
embracing every solitary strand of hair,
counted among the agencies of galaxies
and the brotherhood of a grain of sand,
oblivious that we were ever there.
May 7
May 7, 2026 at 2:27 AM UTC