some days there are
that make you feel time’s standing still

no matter what you do
it somehow in the end is inconclusive
leaves you bereft of any sense
    of celebrating an achievement

you find yourself in eerie limbo
    work without progress for infinity
a prospect rather dreary for your soul
tempting you sorely to do nothing
     succumb to a  paralysis
caused by external unknown forces

    demons, aliens, devils, hostile spirits
    dysfunctional governments or gods
    & cetera

on which you happily can blame
your inactivity

but be aware

life does not care why you do nothing
it simply steamrolls you
     if you are in the way

you better keep on swimming

Desert clean
Purified by the sun's gleam

Sand . . .
in my eyes , nose and mouth

Temperature rising
as I head South

The unbearable burdens
thrown aside

I stumble on
trying to survive

No compass to bear
the sun will show

The choices I made
the resounding No's

Will be purified
Buried in sands of gold

Our house is a black box.
We drape every window

but one, a pinhole
to capture the sun.

At night our eyes go dark as ink.
Our memories marbleize at
the edge of the bedroom.

Come morning,
we are nothing

but inverted images
fed by shared light.

You tell me to smile
and I braid your hair.

Upstairs, the children
develop like ghosts.

I put on another record
and the dark disc spins,

its needle lulled
into grooves the way
you are lulled into me.

We could almost dance together,
but the couple at the window

will not move until
we come into focus.

Time is a witness
to the mark of the moth
in my hair, and I swear
the nights are getting longer

I keep putting it off
hoping I would discover
a star no one knew was there

and I can only wonder why
the bluebirds die
on the power lines singing

if god had a heart
he'd take me instead
and put a thirty ought six
straight through my chest

just for believing
that somewhere there's a nest
with my name on it.

They lie warm together
In the afterglow of torrid love
Her head on his chest, he says
"Sing me to sleep, my love"
So she hums and croons
A tune he does not recognize
With soothing sounding words
In a language he does not recognize
"I love you," he murmurs as his eyes close
"I know," she says smiling
And so, as he sleeps
She lies open-eyed
Imagining a future he will not recognize

                                        By Phil Roberts

I live in the basement, never venturing
upon those stairs, I hear her voice...
"Come up and see me its been to long,
Holding my ears singing my favourite song
repetitively until she is drowned out of
my thoughts. rocks tied to her voice as it
sinks out of view.

I use the stairs that open to the outside,
Lingering looking at this place I called home.
Venturing in the old ford, she lets me drive
it when food is but breadcrumbs and eggs
old enough to birth the dead fetes of a partly
grown bird. I look out though a ***** window
screen, this trip takes two hours each way.

I always wonder if my bald tyres are ever
noticed, but I'm not hindered by the thoughts
of this. So much to see when driving in solitude.
I stop at the side of the road picking cherries,
I slump them in the boot. I may eat upon this
morsel or just hang them outside watching
them swaying in the gentle breeze.

My father just looks out the window.
Doesn't talk much these days his eyes are sunken
like the titanic splintered between two pools.
I move his chair and his arm falls at his side.
collecting it, I put him palms resting on a blanket
He's so gaunt now, he was a strong man now but a shadow.

I look at those cherries lingering above the ground,
shaded from just picked to becoming spoilt, but i
just leave them swaying the aroma fills lungs with
life's eroding perfume, I breath it deeply within.
This is my home, "she never calls me for dinner anymore,
I just make my own, the washing up is festering in
my ignorance, like a garden of petrification flowering.

Saying bye to my dad, I get in the old ford.
Its time to pick some fresh cherries, the tree
is looking unkempt. Its blossom is in honour
of a mother, I hang them all there. My
Mother hung there for a long time ,but she's
long gone. So I bring other cherries to the tree
to show that she'll never be forgotten....

he stares
he covets
he loves
he hates

not only the elixir,
its anesthetizing allure,
but also its vessel

in which he can see
reflected, his hands,
his mouth

though not his eyes;
they reveal too much:

his last human touch
lambs on blood red fields of war
his mother gasping her last breath
his stillborn son

in this parley
his eyes cannot belie  
he hears screaming voices
in an empty, stone
quiet room    

the glass, then, will win;
‘tis an unfair balance; its perfect
symmetry, its solemn silence
the almighty alchemy it holds  

against him--his ghosts,
his hands, his mouth, all ready
to concede defeat

Years after giving up the game
for good I still dream of turning
up late to a match juggling
a chipped red racquet,

high-impact lenses,
salt tanned right hand
glove and two
blue ***** fresh in the can,

my dream court receding
down darkened halls,
a warren of identical doors,
portholes slashing avocado

carpet with watery cross ties,
florescent flickers that merge and pool,
flushing me into flat light within
a stark white cube to toe the red

service line once again
only to find my forehand
serve impeded by jumbled
tables, five drawer files, armoires, roll top desks and bureaus

arranged into the crooked lane plat of medieval Bruges.  
Racquetball,
a game of angles
gone sadly out of fashion,

the MacGuffin in my dreams,
as it was in my playing days
when you were my true opponent,
King of Center Court running me,

stroking passing shots, methodical
while I hurled myself heedless
headlong into walls, losing on points,
nursing trophies of bruises.