Camouflage
seeps into spaces
etched in concrete,
the places
between oceans swept,
air blown
outside wild shadows.
This skin
resists insistent erosion,
mixes faces
beyond every false start.
Reflections
dance, drip checkered lights,
wipers sweeping
midnight’s rush.
We are slow
to weave our stories.
Moonlight combs
dry leaves to memory,
no imprinted
names on ghosted windows.
He echoes
this night of slipped shadows,
speaks words ripped from his own pages,
phrases you
wish to recall in morning’s dew.
Eyes
haunt, caught in moments only his.
He sees you,
through you, and you repeat,
voices his
regrets, his sorrows, his burnt wishes,
but they’re
the same as everyone else’s.
Nothing vanishes.
You could step outside yourself
and catch
his glance in mirrored time,
try to walk
the imprint he leaves,
knowing you
could never live who he truly is.
clothes drip
like laundry
on disjointed
limbs etched out.
He sticks
out like fresh cream,
armour rusted
in salt dust,
plasters a
smile on the iced street.
Night's glimmer creeps into his eyes,
tells you things
he wants to forget,
dreams of lucid
summer, what he can’t resist,
when clouds
forgot to sweep his sight.
He walks
tall beneath moon shimmer,
winter aching
his bones,
seeps wisdom
like milk,
this sustenance
that should sustain him,
but he is moulded
from water.
It flickers
sometimes on the surface
of ideas
stretched too thinly,
memories he
can’t block,
old phrases
that used to work,
the silences
he’d rather forget.
Yet we can
walk and talk and be ourselves
on these
silent streets keeping their truth.
We can be
bonded through small things,
be a safe harbour
in this weathered storm.
