Weekend Guests

We are intertwined I remind myself
Your mind, my body
My body, your kindness

The hedgerow brambles are yellow
And orange
Dark red, light green

The berries are bright, bright
Crimson
Gorgeous as the seldom seen

I once bought the book Trees and Shrubs
Yet, as with most things
I didn't study it thoroughly

Therefore this morning
I look on the lime green leaves
Flayed out, small, petit, perfect and welcome

Yet I cannot give them a name
Just as certain that I cannot give you a name
Other than your name, my love

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Elsewhere

The grey light is slowly lifting
The dull trees, they were hard to fake
Your absence, as the mist about to break
To break me, to make me of nothing

Trees dotted about the hillside
Crows out on the road, picking at the roadkill
Eddie Reader sings of Macushla (My darling)
You my love are elsewhere, in Rickmanswowrth

Between the windmill and the plough
Between the nighttime and the now
Forsworn and forsaken
What is taken is taken
What is lost is lost
It's magic is moved, somehow at cost

I have no thoughts of mink
Nor of the sweeping swallows
I fear for a life that turns to indistinct
Nowhere to go, no one who follows
I fear, for a vine halfway to the brink
Feel for fallow, feel for deeper hollows

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Solo

I could so easily be nowhere
Just by losing you
I could for certain be at a loss
Without a purpose, or a point of view
For anyone to notice

I hold this fear, guard it
Prevent its visibility
Denying the vulnerability
Appearing strong, confident even
Not tearful, no, not tearful at all

We will meet that day
And I know you fear that too
You express the thought
With clarity, with lucidity
Soft skin, warm skin

Understand I shout
I want more to understand
I want less to understand
Lay by me, hold onto me
Take my loss; give me purpose

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Name Dropping

A night
Stuffed full of
Hughes, and Harrison, and Armitage

The first one being named after my first wife's cousin
The second one being my current partner's married name
The last one being my house name at Penistone Grammar

Names that have formed me
Names that have forged me
Names that have forced me
To tell you my name

Yet you see it isn't my name; no
It is my father's name, also my brothers use it too
But I prefer my mother's maiden name

Her father's name
My grandfather's name
Kaye, Arthur Kaye; yes, that is my preferred lineage

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Missing The Mark

I was with an old employer, there were three or four of us, sat in a room, I was being told how the business functioned, specifically how sales and marketing worked.

It was classroom stuff, textbook theory, then they showed me a poster, which they had been working on; they were clearly excited about it, they were looking forward to launching it at a weekend soirée.

The poster was A3 size, or slightly larger, it had an urban street scene, with housing, and street lighting for background; the foreground was laid out, in grid formation, with the companies industrial products.

Above the grid was a white area, with quite a lot of large font text, which on reading I took to be from a novel, nothing at all to do with the work as far as I could see, although I did not read the text to the end.

I made one or two half-critical remarks, dampeners you might say, but we moved on; thousands were to be printed, everyone and anyone should have one, they were very excited, you will be able to make the weekend won't you Christopher, one of them asked.

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