Interrupting (A Poem in Three Parts)

pt1: 

An instant increase in volume 
interrupts my walk in the woods: 
my formidably crunchy thuds 
and my breath, 
a bit behind me, an unseen creature. 

But the bird sounds I carried from the onset,  
like kites fastened to my heart.  
Their giddy opera a crowded indulgence 
felt perhaps by a florist.  

My mind is in London 
in a thousand bathroom mirrors; 
it’s at my wedding and my funeral. 
Let’s try to summon it. 

Obligingly I kneel and dance my fingers  
in a small velvety stream. 
The mud below billows as I disturb it, 
like a dragon’s breath.  
I clench it into forms like fossils, feeling a Hobbit.
Bathwater running is a lonesome tune, 
like a drunk I’m in and out. 

A worm! 
My shock ushers shame-- 
as if God’s dangling my delusions, 
laughing at my lies.

There’s a strange object on the ground, 
innocent at my feet.  
It’s lumpy round and greyish brown. 
It seems to bear the mass of darkness.  

How unsettled we become by that which we cannot name.
And yet how distinctly the thing triumphs 
in the front canvas of my memory, 
clearer by far than the views, the facts. 

It’s really the rotting head of a mushroom, 
amputated from its root in space and time. 

Fungus...growths...they are the unsaid, 
the elephant in every room, 
the corners of our eyes,  
the spider on the wall. 
Like fantoms, they’re here and not.  
Unlike fantoms, they prop and suggest. 
Fantastic, enticing and dangerous-- 
female, people would say. 

People say all is made of the same stuff. 
I’m suddenly aware of the center of the earth and the presence of my organs 
here in these woods. 

pt.2: 

Moving on, my wet hands icy gloves, 
I think the present has slapped me 
and as so often occurs,  
what is thought becomes. 

This place is beautiful! 
The late afternoon sunlight  
slicing long strips through the branches.  
There’s a metallic glimmer, 
a dog barking in the distance. 
Ah, the relief of coming to. 

Though the trees’ jerky limbs web across the milky sky,
Little hints of spring can be spotted, a bud here, a tuft there.
Or some of that green-- vividly sickly,  
the transparency of a tadpole, a baby.  

Still, not all that dies can come anew: 
to my left lies an ancient stone wall. 
Apparently the rebels hid their weapons 
in ones like these. 

I suppose cramped in the root, rock and soil, 
like heavy sacks, is the weight of history.  
These walls contain soldiers, ropes and hand-penned letters, 
they contain hands.  

I lean and press my own  
on the cool knotted mess,  
nearly hearing whispers from within,  
humming human secrets. 

pt.3: 

Then it’s gone and the heart beats alone. 
I press on, the pragmatically purposeful  
one-eyed march home, the next thing. 
Thrice more is my stride interrupted:

Firstly, when wet beads on a naked branch
invite the thirst to taste; 
Secondly, when I kick a pebble  
recalling changing as a kid. 

Lastly, when I arrive at a fence crowning the neighbouring hill. 
Out there in the hazy olives fields,  among all things,
is a single horse.  
This vague view I fix like a window,
and it’s definitely turning its back.
No reach, no angle, this is not my life.
I see my regrets like an old man.

Balloon

Which side?
Convinced but never certain, we shift
this way and that
in the congested signals of the Cloud, 
with no anchored answers. 

Our shouts and seasick pitches are laminated
by a vibrating lipstick silence. 

Knock-knock...
Against a definitely maybe other-side
we distractedly graze,
Rallied by those inner dreamers and fugitives. 

While freedom is an unhappy happy word, 
Happy is a is a happy happy word,
which mercilessly stains our time. 

Being shaped and shoved keeps 
me paralyzed, addicted, 
And thus
as I wait to be real
I can only hope to dig, pin, crease. 

Dip 

The pounding bell of my heart  
signals the train’s blinding lights.  
Spoiler: no story,  
no sad sorrow, no sorrowful sadness. 

Here I plummet arm over head, 
avalanching compulsive coils-- 
in other words, 
I throw a shadowy blanket. 

Placing pain in a safe sells its sight, 
but also breastfeeds its might. 

I join the army of faceless scavengers, 
in the deep blacks of endless tracks. 
We scratch our backs against the rocks,
we missed the train, we know nothing else.  

‘Others’ breathe distracted bees,  
Steady with ideas, ideas, ideas.  
Meanwhile I wake to the burden of a body, 
the perverse tick, tock, pine for bedtime. 

Delayed voices breed and cower 
curling covers, 
standing nightstands, 
swinging light-switches... 
like maggots run on battery power. 

I reason: 
to burn forgets ashes, to melt swells substance.
For long I long to become 
the covers 
the nightstand 
the light-switch. 

I pace at a pace I don’t remember,  
sounds loud then distant, dissonant. 
Your words are the alphabet, the radio,
I touch solid things in the corridor. 

Is that the front door or an airplane window?
Squinting, everything sparkling bliss,  
I step outside an outsider, greeted 
by cats’ chat, people’s chirp, a bird’s kiss. 

Now in this empty swimming pool 
the sky-umbrella halts horizons; 
You cannot hide a naked fool 
for the corners have no curves. 

without warning 

Released is my grip on the side of the world!
On carries the current of vibrating surrender! 
Eyes stinging yet firmly open,  
Body rocking yet firmly a rock, 
Like a washcloth I kick and kick-- 

And in no time, prior to the chime, 
I am marrying my first breath, 
I am swimming with the others,  
I’m a life, I’m passing, I’m watching.
Are you?

Margaux

At fifteen years old you died.
Fifteen years later, 
rare are the days I think of you.
At yet, you’re in my dreams…
every, single, night.

I tried to analyse, I tried to understand,
Subconscious this, repression that, Dr brain at hand.
But finally.. like a switch, the answer is so clear:
It’s not about me, it’s about you. 

You have been ripped from this world  before you were ready.
You did not want to go.
So you stayed! in so many ways.
Simple as that.

A fool, I was, for not believing.
My first friend, my first best friend.

I think you would have gone to a good university.
I think you would have had a nice flat.

Into womanhood, you would have dressed to the nines,
burning with passion, strength and beauty.
Your smile still the biggest, warmest smile I’ve ever known. 

I vow to carry you with me.
Holding hands once again.
This time, I will show you things,
And I will never let you go.