On needing more time.

But actually, inside, it's still dark, if I were to be really honest. Raw and open and touchy as a wobbly tooth. Don't impinge on my darkness just yet.

Untitled.

Stumbling around in the semi-dark

Tense and worn

Can't find a dry spot to rest on

Can't find a shoulder to lean on.

Heathcote

River slide by me

Silently

Soothe me

Cool hand on fever

Untitled.

I come here among and between the tall trees
Leaf bound and light bound
Darkly perfect and tightly rooted in the cool ground

I make myself a hollow for my home
Finding I am not me less my grief
But there is room here for that too.

Untitled.

I actually saw the alarm go off
Just for a moment, before you hit the snooze button.
You know as well as I do that you should be getting mentally prepared,
Because morning is well on its way.
The bulbs are doing their bit, peaking sleepy faces up out of the cool earth
Dozing by the river, by the letterbox, up in the Park.
Almost time for you to lumber out of the long night
Pull on your garments, put your face on and
Join the living.

Lyttelton

I never tire of the port

Of the sea birds, smell of fish and chips, accents, hippies and white trash dogs.

I never tire.

I never tire of it already humming when I arrive,

Brimful of oil tankers, container ships, fishing boats, ferries, tug boats, ships carrying logs or cars or fertilizer.  I never tire of the port, keeping itself busy with trucks, buses, cars and tiny yellow helmeted people driving forklifts and other lifting, carrying, moving, shifting, stacking and unstacking machines.  I never tire of it quiet and empty, sea hovering placidly around the wharf, not bothering to look busy.

I never tire of the port, of the rocky outcrops on the hill tops, pushing their scarred faces into the soft bosom of the sky.  Of the yogic clouds sinking lower, lower, a little lower, over green-gold hills, of the glassy sea coloured sea, routinely defying description, or of the rocks, or of the heads, or of the fall down, tumble down jetties.  I never tire.

Hiatus

Poetry's gone sour in my blood

Words stagnant and moulding

Big black dog been sitting on 'em for so long they 

unfurl slow, folds in all the wrong places

Crooked and cold and stiff, like myself.