᠅
I am going to pass
you by, O tense spirit
of times long fled.
Hunched in the doorway
you shuffle out smoke
from fluted nostrils
like a conscious warning
not to approach, even if
sixty metres away –
with a host of mislaid souls
blotting your sightline –
I’m invisible to you
and your shades reflect nothing
beyond the vaguest sense
of a need to mask
the littleness behind them.
It’s churlish relief to note
some ageing puppy weight,
much as I, more palpably, have gained,
for causes I once ascribed
to your not so good self.
I cried until my throat closed.
Why exactly your thread,
ragged but persistent,
kept hauling me across
coal and high tide,
is a riddle known only to
the waves of vapour
as they merge with the air
between frame and eye.
Nick Cooke has had around 75 poems published, in a variety of outlets including Acumen, Agenda, Ink Sweat & Tears, the High Window Journal and Dream Catcher, along with around 35 poetry reviews and literary articles. In 2016 his poem 'Tanis' won a Wax Poetry and Art competition.
you by, O tense spirit
of times long fled.
Hunched in the doorway
you shuffle out smoke
from fluted nostrils
like a conscious warning
not to approach, even if
sixty metres away –
with a host of mislaid souls
blotting your sightline –
I’m invisible to you
and your shades reflect nothing
beyond the vaguest sense
of a need to mask
the littleness behind them.
It’s churlish relief to note
some ageing puppy weight,
much as I, more palpably, have gained,
for causes I once ascribed
to your not so good self.
I cried until my throat closed.
Why exactly your thread,
ragged but persistent,
kept hauling me across
coal and high tide,
is a riddle known only to
the waves of vapour
as they merge with the air
between frame and eye.
᠅
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