You ring, and tell me
he died this morning.
A lot of people have died
this morning.
I didn't know he was
among them.
I didn't even think
about it.
The stars we sleep under
fade with the sun.
They're so many million
years away.
Under is an old direction.
The sky is older.
You say he died.
I knew you'd say that.
Though I didn't think of it
till now.
Or about stars
but the weather, I have it
with me all the time,
its games with my skin.
The electricity
splices into mine.
Your weather on the phone
is mist – the past is tears.
You tell me why you call.
The past sits on my shoulder.
It hovers near your face,
then explodes like stars,
moves fast, away,
fades in your voice,
takes only millions of years
to burn out.
He went, quick.
We want to say
slow down.
Three birds in the shadows
of a tree, where the green still hangs,
the last juice to spread onto brick paving.
Three sparrows call loudly,
like argument, bird agreement,
who knows, in the dry and yellow chill.
Feel the regular fall of a hammer
or shot of a staple gun.
A straight woody song of work day
with its roll of traffic. People
walk quickly down the lane, hauling
parcels or machines, falling metal
flatter than a bell's tone, a telephone.
Imagine a mobile's digital roar
into that unseen space, virtual
and close, where decisions and excuses
cross each other from the next corner
to the world, though the air seems clear
except where wind scrapes cloud
ovr the distant city lines.
ASnd downstairs, in the unknown quiet,
more work is taking place. Not yet,
but soon, under my feet I'll find
bent metal, product of the soft grind
of unlawful entry, scraped wood,
spaces fenced by dust where things stood,
possessions, now virtual, beyond time
in the insurance paperwork's lines,
and the quiet muddy tracks
of the burglar's daily works.