44

I am on that easy street

Warm wool socks

On my fresh bathed feet

Feeling good, feeling neat

Softer rock

With a rich, irregular beat

I have this time

To sit half still

I have a dime

With desire to fill

I think on back, to that seat

No more clocks

Nor ledgers to complete

Looking out, as if on retreat

Swirling frocks

With feelings running deep

I have this line

As if by that rill

I have my mind

With hope instilled

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43

This is one warm feeling

I don't give a fig to what others say

To have the beautiful pleasure

A calm, energised, peaceful mind

As the snow falls

And the logs on the wood-burner

Glow

And the music, on the stereo

Is as liquor on curvaceous glass

Is as footprints in soft warm-wet sand

No remorse, neither escape from nostalgia

To go just wherever that last thought takes me

As if to candy floss at the fairground

As if to that kiss, along the Golden Mile

There is no need to go deeper

All of depth is already in our memory

Or in our projections for the future

Remember Findhorn Foundation

The beach through the forest

Yachts in the bay

Walks to the pub and store

Then the road out to Ullapool

With moorland, mountains

Ponds at the roadside

With deep reflections

Of sun and moon

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42

He threw the signed copy of his book into the desert

The last place where he knew of her whereabouts

I do want to, I don't want to

I will want to, I won't want to

We did want to

Didn't we want to

I may walk, I may not walk

Did we want to walk

Where the last of the waves

Scored the descended flatness of sand

He did want to, he didn't want to

He will want to, he won't want to

They did want to

Didn't they want to

He may walk, he may not walk

Did they want to walk

Where the last of the ridges

Scanned the intended emptiness of land

It is cold, it isn't cold

Snow came, snow didn't come

He wanted to

She wanted to

It was dark, it wasn't dark

Driving in the blizzard

Where the last of the drifts

Shaded the rendered Rio Grande

With the headlights, without the headlights

Into the blizzard, out of the blizzard

Follow the red lights, don't follow the red lights

We did want to

Didn't we want to

I may drive on, I may not drive on

Where the last of the snowstorms

Waved goodbye to the tendered demand

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41

It isn't that I don't want to write

And it isn't that I don't have time to write

I have all the time in the world

Sat in this lay-by, watching the traffic stream by

I could always say that I had a breakdown

Car breakdown that is, nothing too dramatic

Or I could say that there had been a bad accident

Not that I was involved, but the road was closed

It isn't that I mind telling fibs

And it isn't that I spend my whole life telling fibs

Yes I know I do have whole pockets of deceit

Sat here, under the blue sky, in the warm morning sun

Always a friend of the silver birch

And the maroon aubergine tint to the tops of the hedgerow

Always a friend to the silhouettes of the wizened old trees

Set off by the silver sky, sunlit from the heavens

Yesterday evening, after bathing whilst reading Fante

I thought about brinksmanship

He uses that trick time after time

This time you think, make her this time, but no, he doesn't make her

He backs off, and you back off with him

Leave me alone he cries, just back off won't you

And that's exactly what you do do

Time after time

You could tell them that you don't feel like it anymore

That you have done your stint

It's time for new blood

Time to let the youngsters have a go, let them have a right go

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40

Light turns

My room becomes dark

The fire glows

I am bathed in music

And warmth

Dusk arrives

A little more slowly

As the years change over

I am easy with love

And care

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