Cheese shop window cat
Seagull versus hermit crab
Skiffs pull through the tide
Siesta breakfast
Siesta breakfast
Cool fresh fruit on hot-slept sheets
Life awakes again
Clouds beyond clouds
clouds beyond clouds
charcoal layers far horizon
pewter smeared across, an artist’s chalk
birdsong breaking silence
The Althings sceptre
I grabbed the Althings sceptre, bit the stone from its setting and swallowed. “Don’t worry,” said the guard, “we can wait.”
Heart
Heart of straw, danger of overexcitement and collapse due to too heavy breathing;
heart of sticks, beware of pick-up artists;
heart of stone, resisting all blandishments.
My heart is meat, hot, red. Warm your hands and your own.
Beach (Dunkirk)
Bullets spit up sand
Hands over ears we cower
No red poppies bloom
I’m sorry
Jak thought he would write something a little different, something in a language that was not his, but it all went wrong. He thought he said he was sorry but it was not that at all.
It was an hour before
It was an hour before. Hearts raced. People looked at the sky. This year, perhaps this year? The gates opened. So did the heavens.
I held the old man’s hand
I held the old man’s hand. I had never asked his stories and now, as his last breath left, the library inside him burned.
Three a.m.
In the darkness there is a light
In the darkness a hand to hold
My heart beats, beats
My heart beats with yours
In the darkness a hand to hold
In the darkness a light
simonsalento 