A Single Touch

A single touch 
Can signify a multitude, 
A hand to cheek can sting 
Out with a shock. 
Or slowly trace 
A tear as it meanders, 
As if ordained by life 
From eye to drop. 

Linger softly 
As a final parting, 
Wryly take a thumbful 
Give a tug. 
Pat a beat of angry 
Condescension, 
Tremble gently 
As an act of love. 

So give my cheek 
Your hand my darkest lovely, 
Let your palm inform  
What I shall feel. 
A single touch will 
Give me understanding, 
A single touch 
Is all I think I need. 
 

Separation 

An eleven year olds 
Young mans shoulders, 
Hunched tight 
To broadening neck. 
Head bowed 
Hands to face, 
Refusing to leave the car 
Too tired and emotional 
To end this Saturdays visit. 

Paternal hug, one armed 
We backseat the hatchback. 
Estranged through separation 
He wants his Daddy home. 
Two generation's tears mingle 
And there are no words 
Of comfort 
For father and son. 

Both must mourn the temporal death 
Of a marriage interred  
In mutual disharmony 
 

Late Night One Way Conversations   

At 2a.m. the other night 
At a party 
I met a guy 
Whose first words were: 
"Humanity is like a guy 
At midnight 
At a party. 
Who started early 
Who knows he should go home 
For the rest, 
For the best, 
For the morning. 
But stays on anyway." 

Surprised at first 
At slurred words so deep,  
I turned to talk 
But he had gone asleep. 
 

 The Tree
 

I could rationalise our graft
That point of growth
Forever lost
Embedded deep
In callused bark
A denser ring
A whirl of dark
Cut through 
The trunk of time.

I could tantalise my eye
Lose vision 
To a single view
With endless touch 
Delay the cure
As weeping limb 
Is cased in burr..

I could see it
As a stone
Caught up in roots
As I have grown
Incorporated in the frame
Integral yet alien
Familiar yet strange.

Or look above 
To spreading sky
A hint of heat
In mornings light
A web of twigs
Prepared to bud
As spring awakes from winters night.

I can do many things,
But

Suffice to say 
That I have grown
A rounded weal 
Around the thorn
Of fencing wire
Left there too long
Cut and rusted 
Where it was shorn
Twisted
In its extremities..
But held within
A ring of death
Whose purpose 
To protect the host
A gleaming shard
Preserved for life
Time capsule cased
In hardened shell
A history
Of our intermingling

And

I suppose a tree must have its knots
A spiral grain
Can make the wood
A plank when hewn
Can tell the tale
Of a life been lived
The things withstood.

And so
I rationalise our graft
A stillborn growth
Contained within
A knot within
The rings of time
A moment when
You called me mine.
 

Untitled
 

Discarded clothes
Lie like a corpse
On the bedroom floor.
He lies in his bed
Inert afraid
Like a desert living seed
Awaiting rain,
In shallow soil
That’s as arid
As a priest might feel
When he has his doubts,
Fearing for the death 
Of his vocation.
Knowing that his life
Is full of clouds
And it might rain tomorrow.
 

Flirtation

I could kiss you
With these eyes.
Caress you with
The breath of tender words.
Linger softly with these lips
At every fold and crease
Of uttered verse.

Entrance the senses
With these tactile thoughts.
Impel the pulse of blood
To heady brain.

But I know
You'd think me mad,
So I refrain.