A LIFE ALONE
You talk to yourself
so as to exercise the tongue.
You check on the fish
as a reflex action
and not necessarily
an intention.
You keep the apartment spotless
because you know no one
who spills.
Your clocks don’t so much
measure time
as imprint it on your skull.
You don’t go anywhere.
You crumple up
in familiar places instead.
You watch TV at night
though you have
no favorite programs.
Sleep is not desirable.
It just nullifies
whatever desires
there were.
AT THE SNUFFING OF NIGHT’S CANDLES
Walls interlace variegated veneers
of light into their fabric.
Sunlight rents a third floor room in the city.
A window angle restores a semblance of day,
a creeping clarity, across the floor.
A dressing table shape slowly becomes vase.
Air still chilly, the shy opening of flowers
feels unintentional.
On a bed the color of swan feathers,
a face splits that cosmic egg
into night shell and waking yolk.
At any moment, eyes will meet their counterpart,
straw-lined blue gathering at the glass.
A bird on the sill is cleanly cut like a diamond.
A cloud is severed by reds and golds.
Time slowly imposes objects
on places they have always occupied.
It’s a new world based.
HOW I KEEP FIT
The sidewalks in the city
are like exercise equipment.
There’s a mix of long strides
on the cement treadmill
and the shorter, quicker gait
of the elliptical workout.
A few stand at the street corner,
stationary pedaling
while waiting for the lights to change.
Some hoist brown briefcase dumbbells.
Others try the resistance bands
of the crowd of people ahead of them.
ABOUT THE POET
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, River And South and The Alembic. Latest books, “Subject Matters”,” Between Two Fires” and “Covert” are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Paterson Literary Review, White Wall Review and Cantos.
About the Author
