She didn't want spring,
she wanted autumn.
She wanted
the butterscotch leaves
snuggling the curbs
and porky pumpkins
with fire for a heart.

She wanted autumn
even when underground,
where seasons are unseen
except in the snow
sprinkled in a man's hair,
or heard, a sneeze and a sniffle
into a flimsy tissue.

She wanted autumn back,
like a first kiss over again,
like a childhood memory
flipped to the front of her mind
to stay there,
a vicious, intense red.

But she was stuck in spring,
writing about Octobers,
what happened back then,
how it opened like a flower,
and whether come next year
the season will breathe

orange again.

My clock has stopped.
It says eight forty-four
but it's nine thirty-eight.
It stopped when I wasn't looking
or was looking but didn't notice
a few days ago,
the knobbly black fingers
frozen, pointing west.

I take time off,
feel its chilled curves
dig into my palms,
another river among many.
Held up to my ear
a soft heartbeat,
my thumbs squash
numbers three and nine.

On your back.
The old red tube removed
with my nail
like flicking a splinter
out with a needle.
In snaps the new guy.
With one spin of the white wheel,
a new breath.

How weird
I am here
and you don’t know it.
Sleeping they say,
in a better place.

George on my right
has been gone for years,
even the flowers all brown
gave up God knows when.

I wonder if you knew
your neighbours
before the batteries stopped.
Did Edith know Agatha?
Did Frank chat over the fence?

Chris was seventy-two,
moved here mid-nineties
when I couldn’t yet hold a pen.
Now just a name
on a slab of stone.

There’s a spot near a tree,
no stone no dirt.
I think ‘that’ll be fine,
a place by myself.’
I shake my head.
They’ll stick me
somewhere else.

These aisles go on and on,
one giant Tesco,
nobody at the tills.

If you could speak,
the stories I’d hear,
the chapters spilling out
like salt from a shaker.
But you can’t talk
and I can only walk past
and wonder how you went.

I. (The Gone).
They have gone.
Why does it bother me so?
A truth,
only a handful of gems
stay bright,
all others
faded
like pencil on paper
until a faint mark remains,
what was, what now is.
Names in conversation,
a drive down the alphabet
then and now,
clotted recollections
breaking apart
each time, stalled
in silent traffic.
A few, needles I suppose,
a shot in the arm
again, again,
I cannot believe
how many times
their voices
painted everything,
but long gone,
no abrasion or impact
to consider, to revise.
On occasion,
a stretch into fog,
icy melancholies
but not always
a echo,
moments to inform
me they can return
if they wish.

II. (The Bare Feet).
So, it is night.
Whorls of cream
came through the door,
sleepyhead next to me,
ragged, tired,
out of juice.
I can only say
‘I knew you would.’
This is not your home
but we’re not far away.
Lipstick less rosy,
sound of drums
still throbs in our ears
but it was worth it,
for confetti,
flecks of gold
whirling around
you, the crowd.
Peachy lights
spray across
your face,
piano black eyes,
warm bare feet.
It is not real
but we can touch,
we can speak.
On our knees,
we look at each other,
I hold you,
the minutes
stutter past
and for a moment
only silence,
silence is all
we need for our words
are used too much.

III. (The Next.)
It took
over a year
but we saw
each other again.
Since the end
of a grey June day,
two years
elsewhere,
forty miles the difference.
He quit,
the right choice
he tells me
as we reminisce,
that’s what it is
these days,
now he looks
for the next stage
and soon
it will be me
who must fully
step into adulthood,
like a foot plunged
into a bath,
too hot, too cold.
Did we expect this?
If we could see
next year
would we smile
or scowl?
Tell ourselves
it’s just the way
things go,
on, on, on.
Now, as I look
out my window,
the faintest tinge
of orange
descending,
I know, he knows
we don’t know
what comes next.

It was a Wednesday,
the postman in glorious blue,
a horrific thin letter
in your mailbox.

Across the street
the plump woman watched,
you tore it open,
birthday present in June.

Rejections, maybe.
But no. Instead
black words
said something other.

Happiness crashed upon you,
jumping up, up and down
as if on a trampoline,
a fire, smothering the dark.

Accepted.
You called it a creative wave,
rising, frothing wildly
and falling again.