Through gaps in the trees I can see Dublin's pier
The Poolbeg stacks are surprisingly clear
Striped and remote, their billowing clouds
are a silvery choke

Here where the roads aren't routes that I know
They are comforting so and offer some bearing
I am followed on high by that pairing

Towers over buildings, towers over pines
Those two yonder towers are the most
on my mind

Here where the leaves are dramatically red,
quietly falling and littering bends
Here where the birches are a heavenly white,
those two yonder towers are the most on my mind

No rest till I'm dwarfed by those towering twins
No rest till I'm flush with the deafening drink
There a horizon and sparingly strewn,
with buoys and boats; sitting strange in the gloom

Sunlight filters through the curtains
and falls on the floor
Cups of chai
are leftovers of our sunday morning
The cold air is quiet still
as if awaiting
poetry

I enter a deep state
of solitude
where soft whispers
are uttered delicately
like wildflower garlands
where worlds meet
without judgement

Where I find you
in all the patterns that come together
to become
a gathering
of me

O Beloved,
this magic of you
is the life pulsating
through my entire
universe

Far beyond the gable ends of dark suburban streets
Riding past the furthest flats where paths give way to fields

Where giant cranes with groaning frames are elevators into space
Looming over dark estates, unoccupied and halfway built
A regiment of vacant digs

Set out just like theatre props; a sort of play not yet begun
The porches laid with welcome rugs for when the future tenants come

And when they take up residence and get their keys and pay their rent
They'll surely never think of me as I have thought of them
The countless nights I've seen to spend, exploring every lamplit bend

Or how I'd trekked those distant places, before they'd laid the first foundations
Beyond the reach of tired feet, where fauns or fairies surely meet

The dark and curing plains are real and stretch for starry miles around
The rustle and din of windblown things, the rush of moonlit clouds

And soon from now when strangers come and pick the perfect house to live
And make it theirs and settle in and pick a room to put the crib
I'll stop the squeak of spinning wheels upon some distant mound or cliff
And moving closer to the lip; Dublin twinkles past the tip

The platform is quiet when I arrive.
The walk home is long.

The road is busy with lights, but no faces.
I should have worn gloves.

Nearly there now.
Someone's home but nobody was waiting.

I pull a smile out my pocket and drop my keys,
Then I listen to words about the day.

My bed brings solitude,
While questions crawl behind my eyes.

Scraping inside my skull, they're familiar,
And I drift off on their backs.

It isn’t as if
I must put on
the Queen’s English
to be around you.

It isn’t as though
I should feel
the need to rebel, or
that my solitude

is a luxury
instead of a right.
Rather, these are
the whale-bone songs

of a well-worn battalion,
poised as I am
at every solstice,
footsore at the door.

This is simply
the ebb and flow
of ambrosia
that sets the pendulum

to swing
in different arcs
of fool’s gold,
the soft footings

at the edge of my radar.
This is the culture shock
of living dead girls
undergoing a seismic shift

in the round
mother-of-pearl
mountain ash,
insinuating

themselves
in a sea of voices,
while shadows cast
a romantic screen.

For every one that succeeds,
millions of others fail.
So tell me
how it should be,

that I could live
on my knees
and weep honey tears
as my dreams escape me.

Because this is
a death of sorts.
The phoenix rises,
only to burn again.

Poverty
is a personal Shanghai,
and just as vast.
I want to believe

that wealth can be
weathered beauty,
Elizabethan colouring,
and a pirate smile.

You get my most
gorgeous parts,
although
my flaws,

innumerable,
hidden
in blind spots,
hidden in ivory,

are discovered
again and again,
as I live between what was
and what will be.

i think of the days when everything is calm, peaceful and serene. i think of the days when everything is chaotic, disruptive and hurtful. but mostly, i think of the days when i’m just living motionlessly. where nothing significant really happens but my heart is aching - reminiscing the memories. the laughters i took for the granted. the smiles i took for granted. the happiness i took for granted but somewhere deep in me always knew that i was bound to feel this way for a long, long time.

motionless.
my life at a standstill while everyone else have their own parties of memories while i stand here - all alone.
bitterness swarm me but i can do nothing.

motionless.
my life it seems. everything in my life.

motionless.
where i’m meant to be.

A duck cuts the water, leaving a thin wake in the quarry.
It is silent. No wind.

You have sat here for a pair of hours, emptying yourself
of questions, of vitriol and doubt, waiting patiently

to see what is left.