It's Still Life

Like Unplugging

I. (for Miz Quickly & PA)

Just A Few

Desires, yes, a few like
seeing brilliance rising off
the sea, morning sky that’s

an aquamarine-holiday colour,
and white-dashed beaches
so bright that your eyes sting,

and silence,
yes, silence from radio voices.
And I still want sex when I’m 85.

But if I must
live in this winter, let it be with
a gloss of frost in the hollows,

breathy fields
of bracken, and oak seeds
free-falling like pin-wheels.

Like being unplugged.
It’s not so much, really.

II. (a haibun for dVerse)

Thankful, yes, for little things, like I’m thankful for my paisley-print shawl. It’s acceptable, age-appropriate attire. No side-eyed glances about mutton dressed as lamb. And I’m thankful that I can choose my own toothpaste, and not that green stuff that tastes like a horse crashing through crumpled water. But mostly, I’m thankful that I’ve not lost the sound of my loved ones voices, those dead and long gone, their voices still follow me around in my head.

Interlaced fingers
life is a parenthesis
words stuck in my throat