He’s a smuggler, bearing certain small
but heavy packages across the borders.
No one knows the powers from whom his orders
come or what authority he’d call
upon, should he be spotted as he drags
himself through brambles or goes burrowing through
the undergrowth. He carries with him few
possessions and his clothes are all in rags—
he doesn’t care: his sole concern is for
the things he carries and the consequence,
should frontier guards discover and inspect them.
He leaves them in left luggage lockers or
on supermarket shelves or under stones,
and no one ever turns up to collect them.

I scribble on a scrap of paper while
she goes to buy a cartridge for the printer.
It’s five o’clock and Wednesday and mid-winter:
I should’ve stayed at home—I’ve got a pile
of work to do and this is wasting time.
Obama’s on the radio again
with promises on gun-related crime
and fighting poverty that hidden men
in long dark rooms will never let him honour.
A woman in white boots. Behind her, on a
bicycle, an old man, very slow.
She doesn’t look it, but somehow I know
she’s pregnant and they have no place to go.
I switch channels. It's an old song by Madonna.

20.

One’s speaking softly in considered tones,
a quietener to his child’s whim. The other’s
sailing the contented seas of early
love. The storms that tried to strike these brothers
down are over now, the bitter taste
has passed, and bells of laughter have replaced
the stones that once we hurled at one another.
Back in the tent, high up on the trapeze,
bracing his body for the triple twist,
the acrobat swings. The great crowd shifts and groans.
He wants their wild applause, but if he’d have it he
must seize the point where his arc has slowed and kissed
the stillness. For this is his gentle Pentecost,
the white dove motionless in zero gravity

20.

One’s speaking softly in considered tones,
a quietener to his child’s whim. The other’s
sailing the contented seas of early
love. The storms that tried to strike these brothers
down are over now, the bitter taste
has passed, and bells of laughter have replaced
the stones that once we hurled at one another.
Back in the tent, high up on the trapeze,
bracing his body for the triple twist,
the acrobat swings. The great crowd shifts and groans.
He wants their wild applause, but if he’d have it he
must seize the point where his arc has slowed and kissed
the stillness. For this is his gentle Pentecost,
the white dove motionless in zero gravity

The people in this place
—what are they doing here?
They come and go like actors in
a play whose star will very soon
begin to show himself,
although we have no clue

which one he is, for they‘re
all so like tin apostle
spoons, not truly separate beings
but figurines, a passive foil
to  the inscrutible hero.
Is that him, that thin

pale figure who just now
is fleeing the inquisitive
crowd? But in a while he too
is slowly reingested, merged
into that far-off world
we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place—what are they do-
ing here? They come and go like actors in
a play whose star will very soon begin
to show himself, although we have no clue

which one he is, for they‘re all so like tin
apostle spoons, not truly separate beings
but figurines, a passive foil to  the in-
scrutible hero. Is that him, that thin

pale figure who just now is fleeing the in-
quisitive  crowd? But in a while he too
is slowly reingested, merged into
that far-off world we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place—what are
they doing here? They come and go
like actors in a play whose star

will very soon begin to show
himself, although we have no clue
which one he is, for they‘re all so

like tin apostle spoons, not tru-
ly separate beings but figurines,
a passive foil to  the inscru-

tible hero. Is that him, that thin
pale figure who just now is fleeing
the inquisitive  crowd? But in

a while he too is slowly rein-
gested, merged into that far-
off world we can no longer be in.

The people in this place—what are they doing here?
They come and go like actors in a play whose star
will very soon begin to show himself, although
we have no clue which one he is, for they‘re all so
like tin apostle spoons, not truly separate beings

but figurines, a passive foil to  the inscru-
tible hero. Is that him, that thin pale figure who
just now is fleeing the inquisitive  crowd? But in
a while he too is slowly reingested, merged
into that far-off world we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place
—what are they doing here?
They come and go like actors in
a play whose star will very soon
begin to show himself,
although we have no clue

which one he is, for they‘re
all so like tin apostle
spoons, not truly separate beings
but figurines, a passive foil
to  the inscrutible hero.
Is that him, that thin

pale figure who just now
is fleeing the inquisitive
crowd? But in a while he too
is slowly reingested, merged
into that far-off world
we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place—what are they do-
ing here? They come and go like actors in
a play whose star will very soon begin
to show himself, although we have no clue

which one he is, for they‘re all so like tin
apostle spoons, not truly separate beings
but figurines, a passive foil to  the in-
scrutible hero. Is that him, that thin

pale figure who just now is fleeing the in-
quisitive  crowd? But in a while he too
is slowly reingested, merged into
that far-off world we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place—what are
they doing here? They come and go
like actors in a play whose star

will very soon begin to show
himself, although we have no clue
which one he is, for they‘re all so

like tin apostle spoons, not tru-
ly separate beings but figurines,
a passive foil to  the inscru-

tible hero. Is that him, that thin
pale figure who just now is fleeing
the inquisitive  crowd? But in

a while he too is slowly rein-
gested, merged into that far-
off world we can no longer be in.

The people in this place—what are they doing here?
They come and go like actors in a play whose star
will very soon begin to show himself, although
we have no clue which one he is, for they‘re all so
like tin apostle spoons, not truly separate beings

but figurines, a passive foil to  the inscru-
tible hero. Is that him, that thin pale figure who
just now is fleeing the inquisitive  crowd? But in
a while he too is slowly reingested, merged
into that far-off world we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place
—what are they doing here?
They come and go like actors in
a play whose star will very soon
begin to show himself,
although we have no clue

which one he is, for they‘re
all so like tin apostle
spoons, not truly separate beings
but figurines, a passive foil
to  the inscrutible hero.
Is that him, that thin

pale figure who just now
is fleeing the inquisitive
crowd? But in a while he too
is slowly reingested, merged
into that far-off world
we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place—what are they do-
ing here? They come and go like actors in
a play whose star will very soon begin
to show himself, although we have no clue

which one he is, for they‘re all so like tin
apostle spoons, not truly separate beings
but figurines, a passive foil to  the in-
scrutible hero. Is that him, that thin

pale figure who just now is fleeing the in-
quisitive  crowd? But in a while he too
is slowly reingested, merged into
that far-off world we can no  longer be in.

The people in this place—what are
they doing here? They come and go
like actors in a play whose star

will very soon begin to show
himself, although we have no clue
which one he is, for they‘re all so

like tin apostle spoons, not tru-
ly separate beings but figurines,
a passive foil to  the inscru-

tible hero. Is that him, that thin
pale figure who just now is fleeing
the inquisitive  crowd? But in

a while he too is slowly rein-
gested, merged into that far-
off world we can no longer be in.

The people in this place—what are they doing here?
They come and go like actors in a play whose star
will very soon begin to show himself, although
we have no clue which one he is, for they‘re all so
like tin apostle spoons, not truly separate beings

but figurines, a passive foil to  the inscru-
tible hero. Is that him, that thin pale figure who
just now is fleeing the inquisitive  crowd? But in
a while he too is slowly reingested, merged
into that far-off world we can no  longer be in.