Neighbour

on the other side of this wall is somebody else’s house full of their things their smells and the memories of their life we say hello exchange cards every Christmas sometimes I bake him a cake but he has never shown me the other side of this wall

Always Room For

Always room for There never is. One book replaces another, even with two inches between them when one falls they all fall. It’s what I dream of: endless rows of books, refugee families housed videos of cats. Happy elbows.

Stanza

They have to go somewhere, these items of furniture; you rely on gut feeling and a little skill. In the main, black is the colour of choice, a twist of squiggles cast into space lined up like crazy soldiers on a white parade ground, individuals I have known since dumb childhood. Now their lives have […]

John

The room is warm, too warm His memories have evaporated. He strokes his harmonica. There is something he recalls about it’s cold, shiny surface. He lifts it to his lips and a tune slips past his forgetting. Happy Days are Here Again captures the nodding heads In the living room and he plays another and […]

From another room

From another room Young voices in their bedroom down the far end of the landing. Our two grandchildren playing together as morning lights up the curtains. They are no trouble nowadays when they stay with us overnight. We can relax in bed. They don’t need us, at least until breakfast time. Listening in from where […]

Work of art

  Work of art Look at this child’s drawing of a tree. Its lollipop top and stick trunk. It’s not a chocolate finger tree in a boxed forest. This tree’s got room. This child’s got vision and should be made Minister of Education.          

Day 8. Room

  All about room. Making room, living room, walking into a strange room. Here’s John Ashbery: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/182860 Room.