The ice cannot always be seen here

It was dark and he pointed at the street. 'There is frozen?', the guy said in an accent. Hungarian or something. I said yes, the street was probably frozen.
'But I cannot see ice' he said, 'How can you know there is ice?'
I said that you just had to expect it, in this cold. You had to expect ice this time of year. The dog pulled at the lead, my husband's dog. If the dog was pulling at the lead it must have been cold.
'I need to be careful, right?' the guy added, smiling and pulling his collar to his throat, 'The ice cannot always be seen here.'

There are always spare seats

I can see you looking for a seat and I guess that if our eyes were to meet, you would see that you are quite welcome here, next to me.
And I might talk to you - but that's okay, right? That's what happens in these situations. Someone is kind enough to offer you a spare seat, and at the very least, a small bit of conversation is normally conducted; phatic, friendly.
And I know where to draw the line, where the clock stops.
So, there you have it. The kind of thing that can go on in a place like this; "Hey, stranger! You're in the same boat as me! Let's paddle together!"
It's not generally the kind of thing one can do in a regular public place, is it? You can't really just draw attention to a seat going spare next to you and expect a rational, safe set of responses.
People will hesitate.
people will doubt.
people will not recognise that they are in the same boat - which they are.
But when the boat is this big, carries this many people, people sometimes don't even realise they're in the boat in the first place.
So this is where the caution sets in. Why is this stranger offering me this seat? What do they want? Well, sometimes they just want to connect with you. And sometimes you don't want that - and that's cool.
But there is nothing to be afraid of, and see that we are all in the same boat.
This is something that can be common ground, because, underneath it all, we are here, looking towards the waters together.
And sometimes people often see something different to what other people see. Some see calm, some see a storm and the trepidation that comes with it. Others see nothing but the water at night, and the unknown journey through it.
But, here, under our feet, there is only one boat, just as there is only one sea. So, take a seat, and tell me your name.

Scream

If you must grieve, grieve.
If you must smile, smile.
If you must scream, scream.
If you must lie, lie.
If you must laugh, laugh.
If you must rest, rest.
But do not every worry,
It is meaningless at best.

The blinds come down gently, real gently.

More roads lead into than lead out of the labyrinth and the sun cannot illuminate them all.
Only the children rush in without fear of ever getting out again.
They laugh, their eyes gladly only seeing a metre or two ahead, never afraid of what might be around the bend or sharp corner.

Only when the sun gives in for another few hours, only then do the children begin to look for a way out.
They glance up, take in the seductive orange and grey of the encompassing sky, and then they notice the shadows which have crept into the labyrinth.

This was the challenge the children did not expect, the suspender of fun.

And as for grown-ups, they figured it out long ago.
They are already gone, short of temper, long in the tooth.

But the children will not be beaten.
They know that one of these roads will lead them out of the unpredictable turns,
away from the closing skies, and into open arms.

The grown ups, they just forgot to remember this.

The rice cooker

I push my fingers into the pan, through the water, into the rice.
I agitate the water, watching as the water swiftly turns cloudy.
The bottom of this pan, only two inches below, disappears from view.
I let the water escape, using the glass lid to keep the rice.
I add more water.

This was the first time I did it like this,
the way which you thought would be best,
if you ever didn't have the rice cooker.

My fingers replicate yours,
the gentle treatment,
watching every grain as it shifts back and forth
and disappears beneath the white clouds.

I think of the watering can,
the flowers pointing towards the blue
as you rain the water down upon them, stem to root.
And all the time watching,
patient and grateful.

You pour the water away,
replacing it with clean water,
and the rice parts for the flow.
It goes into the cooker, and
you turn and nod,
asking if it is alright.

I reply, stem to root,
that all is fine, and I
take a seat,
patiently grateful.

My rice sits in the pan,
the smell of it lifting up to the blue,
and I nod to myself when I
think of you, and I
stand still,
patient and grateful.

Was I looking for your car?

Everything always tears off in huge, bloody strips. I sit here and wait for you, like I have done for years, like I have done for minutes. I am starved from the calm, silent waiting. I have no memory of the taste of anything anymore. Come save me; just your being here will be the nourishment I need.

Whenever I watch you walk home, it is always at dawn. Whenever we say goodbye, it is always under the rain. Time is here, relentlessly here, and vicious, and it is always winning. I imagine you pressing your fingers to the keys, and that life is unfolding in front of you, happening, like the beat of a heart.

Tram lines lead me back to you, to the wish that I had told you I had loved you. Across the table, in the darkness, next to the water; I love you. I would have said it, I really would. But it never came up.

Time is still the years, holding on tight, making me drag them along, as if there was never a time when they were not with me. The years are acting like they are family, and maybe they are by now, because who am I to argue. What do I really know.

Barbed wire on decision sits in my marrow and once in a while tears a strip off the flesh - sometimes with bone, or muscle, and once in a while a tooth or two. My eyes will be torn out eventually, and yet in a way this suits me fine, because it means I will finally stop looking at the clock. There is so much blood around me. There is so much gore in my wake yet you do not see it. You do not even smell it - the living, twitching, damage caused by my decision.

As life saps away, all I can say is I don't know, I don't know. How can even you know. I just don't know. Paralysis, which track to take. The viscera of fear, indecision and complete blindness.

Stone

I can lay my head down to rest at night, and I know that the stone is only four minutes away.
I know that, on the exact same street that my window looks out on to, the window above my head when I lay it down at night, you come to them. The graves.

If I got up at four in the morning, I could silently wander down this one street, and within five minutes come to the stone. Black and still, the trees would stop the moonlight from giving anything definition.
And I could lay down here, with my head on any stone I choose, and sleep there instead, knowing that if I got cold and wanted to return to my bed, it would only be four minutes away, up the street that links it all together.

And the ones in the graves, they could do the same. They could leave their place of rest, and come to my room, and sleep in my bed, hungry to lose the coldness that has held them so tightly and for so long.
I would make way, if they chose to do this. I would understand.
Sometimes I want the abscence of warmth, this stifling warmth that fills not just my room, but my every waking moment.
I want to feel what it is like to be cold, to be still, and let everything crawl away from you, repugnant and uninterested. I would take their place, and they could take mine, just for a while.

The wind would follow me to my outdoor sleep, and perhaps the rain would also. But they would be fine as my final companions before that deepest of slumbers, enveloped in peace and perfect stillness.
And I know this could only happen at night, because if I wanted to stay in my new place of sleep, and the others wished to keep my bed, we would need the night to usher us into our new choices.

We would need one night to gently unfold into day, where we could prepare ourselves for whatever is next.
We would be ready for it, I know.
Ready, after just one good night's sleep.

Seven minutes and seven minutes only

You say to yourself, Everything is vapour,
hence why you cannot feel any of it.
You beg, Please let this be the reason -
please let all be vapour (you continue)
and not simply out of my reach,
as punishment,
as a judgement of you.

You say to yourself,
Let this be the regret you deserve made manifest;
the gentle, blinding sun.
The jagged familiar streets (you add)
leading to the cold, familiar seat.
The whiplash effect of the questions
(you continue)
pouring,
pouring out of those who don't know -
who couldn't possibly understand - that you,
you alone,
here, are poisoned with regret.

You pause, then continue: But at
the very least,
you can learn something from this -
or at least that's the whip
you chastise yourself with.

You say, Now I know why every time someone dies,
someone cries for more time,
If only we'd had more time! (you cry aloud).

You continue, Now I see why
so many see the final event as half-baked, anaemic.
You add, They wish so hard
that they had tried harder before -
sweated, bled, cried,
but never hesitated.

You pause, then say, Now I understand
why the sun never rises over there,
and the moon dangles like this (with a gesture).
I can feel now why the wind
is so punishing (you add quickly),
and the sun so ravaging,
and the cold so entombing.
You pause again, then continue, And I can see why
when we woke up in the middle of the night,
we did it together;
You explain, The first thing of the real world
to fill each other's eyes.

You continue more quickly now, Now I see all of this
but you are gone.
Just cruel moments ago (you add).
You continue, slower, I held you in silence,
straining for the hold to say the words
choked back by unreal pride.
You recall with a smile, You kissed my neck,
the solar winds of breath warming me.
And then you let go (you add, then pause),
and nothing could be said.
You conclude with, You walked away,
real,
then not real.

Then vapour.

Today is like home

The passing of everything, and at such speeds, leaves its mark;
sometimes resembling a bruise such as caused by the acidic, wintery hand of agression,
other times like the imperceptable yet absolute microfractures to the beak of
a bird as it pecks at the warm, unflinching earth.

It takes time to appreciate anything.
Yet nothing slows down long enough to be appreciated properly.
To be savoured, fully loved, and understood.
The fattest, bloodiest chunks are thrashingly removed,
and no consideration is made for whether or not they were the best cuts.
There was no time to tell.
Rip chunks out of nations, islands, oceans and hands. Tear and devour, and then move on to the next one, quickly. We cannot waste time, yet time is wasting us,
delivering us blindly into nothing more than a death sentence.

And, currently, there is nothing but time ahead.
Sometimes, an abundance of it is mistaken for freedom; it looks the same,
and depending on the light, provides the same set of traps.
Lay back, let the moments wash over you, unjudgemental of your decision, even though they are finite.
Don't fill these fractions, unrepeatable cells of existence, with anything because
if you're not getting rewarded, why should you lift a finger?

Racing past; they all come from no where and disappear there again.
There? Then where is here, when they are at this time?
The moments sing, if you let them.
They pour the colors and song over everything, these vessels for every chapter of perceptability.

But that's just one way of looking at moments.
Sometimes every one is a life sentence, other times they are shocks of euphoria.
But if the passing of all is nothing but a slow movement that we all undertake,
then sitting back and making nothing of moments cannot actually happen.
It is impossible to make nothing of what just is - you cannot extrapolate the passing of all.
You can only move to the same pattern,
weaving, rupturing and experiencing to the sound of your own countdown.

The extremist

Now, to begin with; and yet, how
much better would I have felt, having walked away
from the clouds forming over your face,
if I had not caught the final split second glimpse of
that beetle as it glided beneath those forsaken leaves,
confiding in the aspects of nature which
sit upon, but never merge with,
the concrete, shimmering and colourful in the midday sun.

I would have taken comfort in viewing its legs, moving in
grand unison, had I seen it just three seconds earlier.
They would have carried me to a more calm inspection of
your tears, your hidden face. Your absolute disappointment,
which, in all honesty, is not even yours, yet you carry
it like your own sadness in me.
But I have seen it many times before, and I will no doubt
inadvertently bring it out of you again.

There will be times when you will invite in the extremist,
and other times when you will envy and respect me,
not understanding yet swallowing this labyrinthine confusion.

There isn't enough to know here to jettison it all,
perhaps if I just continue it will all make se-


And I can turn it all around so fast, make it all
seductive, positive and forward-thinking.
I can perform magic with what I believe in,
the last fourteen years have had their moments.
But the extremist returns, and he doesn't even need
to knock any more.
He just walks in and gets comfortable
in you bed, or next to your friend,
or on your computer screen, and crawling under
your thoughts as they lay baking in sunburnt confusion.