Gossip

I brought the coffee for him today. It told me something that he let me. Neither of us mentioned it though. We talked business. Gossip of course came into it. There was as always so much I didn’t know. The stories always start with someone I’m sure I don’t know but through connections it turns out I can place them exactly. Someone I went to school with years ago or some shop owners aunt. The bar is doing well he told me and I laughed saying that I knew. I spend my every hour there or so it feels. We have been doing better than the competition in town. I know why but I keep the knowledge to myself, well to the pair of us. We don’t need to say it out loud to each other.

                Town has changed big time since I grew up here. The houses that sit to the east and the west of the High Street are islands of the old ways now. Red bricked squares of a time that went before this one. Those who can remember the carnivals live here, those who don’t have central heating live here, those whose parents lie in the cemetery live here. A small walk from the shops in the centre, convenience stores for groceries, delicatessen for the bread that used to be delivered by the bakers van, butcher but no candlestick maker anymore. The old shoe shop’s crest left to melt into legend but some of us still remember. In amongst the necessaries and the public houses sit the new galleries, glam junk shops and gift places.

                We haven’t changed. The carpet probably does need changing but you can’t get that old style anywhere anymore. The prices rise yearly alongside the budget but no more than 5p. There is no red wall, no magnolia paint and wine is less than three quid. One bar has a TV the other does not. That’s our secret.

The gossip was old today. It went back to the times long before me. A secret baby and a long time of someone pretending to be an aunt to their own daughter. No one knows still. I thought as ever that I didn’t know who it was but of course I did. A woman he has always told me was beautiful when they were growing up. Who has always kissed him gently since the illness. We didn’t make the connection together but I knew that for once this wasn’t gossip so much as confession. I should have known that this would be the last time. 

Wave (II)

We can all understand it now like we couldn’t before,

That height is not the issue just as always force.  

Screaming, plunging invading army,

From the sea, from the sea.  

Undefended north at the mercy,

Of the never again tide.  

The one that provides the nightmare and the warning,

That strikes recklessly where it can kill the most.

I have seen not once but twice the fear,

That echoes in the eyes of those who survive.

That senseless understanding cannot be ordered,

Cannot be swept away and cannot be told.

Unable to be free of the seas hold,

Even in rebuilt homes and cleaned up streets.  

But that is a long way off, a dream, a myth.  

First there comes safety, then the physical comfort,

Of blankets, food, water, baths and kind thought,

From strangers alien and unable to know,

That this ocean will never recede,

 But always dance,

Just below the eyeline waiting for it’s next chance. 

A Thai Night

Something about being away again made me come back to this-I started it in Thailand and the picture only became more vivid to me after I left.

The heat abates suddenly and becomes a memory shared with the night.

I tell it about you too so our memory can stir into one.

It feels like it holds onto you for me like a net in the water.

I like it but it only makes it harder.

This is mine to have but what is it if I cannot share it with you?

Every thought and especially the pictures echo:

A hollow photograph of someone else’s choosing.

I never could be on my own.

What I did not know before I saw this blue sky,

Was that whoever else holds me dear,

There is always a bit of me left behind to watch with you.

Making crowds and solitude blur together.