You wanna know what it’s like? He says.
I’ll tell you what it’s like.
It’s like walking around with a ‘Vacant’ sign around your neck.
Like being scooped out by an excavator.
Or being a songbird without a voice.
It’s like walking along a jetty studded with couples clinging to each other like barnacles on pylons.
It’s like being on the esplanade ripping into a pulled pork burger like an animal ‘coz you’re on yr own so it isn’t all bad.
That’s what it’s like.
The bus shelter at the end of our street
grinds its teeth at night.
Sometimes I sit with it, hold its hand, listen to its tale
of drunks and suicides,
of lycanthropes baying at the full moon,
of lost Lotharios weeping in their fists
I talk to it too about my problems
Of the jig-saw days when pieces don’t fit
Of the times when your heart races
Like a wildebeest on the veldt
But latches onto nothing.
After a while we both settle
and I head off home
beneath a lopsided moon.
sketch courtesy of Yofukuro on Pinterest: Yofukuro is a Japanese artistic duo, the brothers Selichi and Daisel Terazono
I did not know the way to the waterfall
I was beaten,
hollowed out,
lonely as the last leaf on a tree
tramping, tramping
when suddenly my phone leapt
in my top pocket;
it was my grand-daughters,
their voices
tripping over each other with excitement,
telling me
they were coming to Adelaide,
that I would see them soon,
and suddenly
I was there, refreshed in the waterfall
of their voices,
like a baptism
*pic by Pinterest
Just us then?
Yeh, just us.
What we gonna talk about?
I dunno,
I dunno either.
they both look into the distance contemplating the grim prospects ahead
Poor Jess.
Yeh.
She’s had a bad trot recently, Lost her wallet last month and then lost her balance in the bathroom.
Broke her hip.
Yeh. And only a few days ago she trips over the cat and breaks her arm.
Accident prone.
Yeh, you could say that.
Must be hard to dress herself with one good hand, wipe her bum.
Think she’ll phone?
Hope so; otherwise it’s just us, the two bozos.
Isn’t it her turn to bring the wine?
It is.
they look into the distance again
Miss her a bit.
Me too.
Hard to get a word in sometimes when she’s here.
True. I don’t like the way she interrupts sometimes.
Still. She puts up with us. That shows character.
True. Do you think she’ll come next week?
Hope so. Otherwise it’s …
Just us.
they look into the middle distance again quietly quaffing their ales.
Nanette ‘winked’ me again last night.
I have not been on an internet dating site for years.
Nevertheless, Nanette has been constant.
A wink is as good as a nod ….
One day I’m going to weaken.
I will go down the rabbit hole of curiosity,
the labyrinth of love
and leave no note.
I may never return.
Let me in. Let me in, I say.
I’ve been locked out.
Do you know how late it is?
Maybe it’s a mistake. I forgive you.
Just let me in. Please.
I need to get back inside my own body
So I can get to sleep.
* photo by Gina Neri from Unsplash
You okay, mate? You look forlorn.
Like the knight in ‘La Belle Dame’? I say.
Pardon.
‘Alone and palely loitering.’
Sorry.
‘On the cold hill side’. Keats, I say. “La belle Dame Sans Merci’
Who?
John Keats. Romantic poet. You must have done him at school.
This is a butcher’s shop, mate. Not an English classroom. What can I get you?
There was someone on the bridge
Curving high over the dark water
About half way along
Then there wasn’t.
Someone with a mop of ginger hair
an orange top and grey track pants
Standing against the railing
Looking wistfully out.
I looked away when a siren sounded
On the headland then looked back.
No splash.
No disturbance of any kind.
No bright lithe form spearing
Through the water.
No one emerging from either end.
Nothing.
Just someone standing on a bridge
in a forest
Then there wasn’t.
The bus shelter at the end of our street grinds its teeth at night.
Sometimes I sit with it, hold its hand, listen to its tale
of drunks and suicides,
of lycanthropes baying at the full moon,
of lonesome Lotharios weeping in their fists
I talk to it too about my problems
Of the jig-saw days when pieces don’t fit
Of the times when your heart races
Like a wildebeest on the veldt
But latches onto nothing.
After a while we both settle
and I head off home
beneath a lopsided moon.
John Malone 