HANGOVER/I WALK

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Hangover
Hungover at the kitchen sink
I stop.
Morning moon,
a pale nursery of stars.
Yesterday orphans itself in offering –
the strident day refuses,
but I take it in,
and like a cat with a chewed ear
it drinks in the corner of my room. 

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I Walk
I walk
because I don’t want to write,
and because it is easy.
And I would not have seen
the proud banner erupting
wound-red over the roof of the school,
or the lilac dyeing of the slow canal,
or heard the buzzing of the shuttered garages
of the new builds by the wharf
sheltering young families away,
if I had not been walking.
I walk,
and I am in awe at bridges
more than most things.
There is a stick in the river,
and it does not move,
though the water moves.
And I would not have seen the river,
and I would not have seen the stick.
A climb of rust rashes the wall
of the tyre factory,
and the echoing voices of men
punish the girders,
for lack of a song of home,
as the cranes lower their necks against the sky.
Behind the fish market
a puddle of oil
poorly reflects the clouds –
a Pinocchic dream.
I walk,
and the night comes measured,
like a litmus test.
And I would not have seen the dog
sitting outside of the bike shop,
and it is always a shame
to not have seen a dog.
And now at last,
because I am walking,
I remember
what it is like to write.