Lying on my back on the single bed.
(The only one the bedsit provides )
Below me the thump thump of Rock music
Provides a pulse to the building.
Above me the chatter of radio voices…
Interrupts the void – muddles the silence.
‘J’ chops onions and momentarily the sun
seizes the blade and wrestles with its light
Before casting it back into the shadow
The smell of fried onions makes my nostrils
flinch and my eyes tear-up.
On the table the jars of spice-cooking utensils.
Simple things for a dull concentration.
Quiet abstraction away from cruel metaphysics.
The indecipherable geometry of ideas.
More like Matisse’s giant shapes in primary colours.
Cut by arthritic hands and mounted on the wall.
I wish we could undo the serrated hurt within.
Revisit the life we once happily shared.
Discard words like claws wrapped in towels.
Scatter laughter around the room and teach
our bodies to sing and celebrate together again.
Black coffee,non filter cigarettes- car keys.
On the wall the poster ‘Ski Woche Davos’
My thoughts like ash -earrings on the bedside
table next to my passport I will put them in a airmail letter I will probably never send on.
Is memory a cage,a trap or just fools gold”?
She says as she turns the door handle and leaves.
I truly wish I knew
I turn away from the sun and face the blank wall.
Perhaps tomorrow…. perhaps.
.
Malcolm Paul
Picture Nick Victor
.