Coda

I’ve been chasing dust of road into sky

I had the best intent, rust into lust

exit the dreams of angels and pin-prick star skies

hold on to motion, an imperfect gaussian motion blur into a white stripe hit the side

Found myself sliding a hand down a stark cold metal bannister

trying to stop myself contemplating forgiveness over a grey mush of thoughts

Give up the thought of being prepared, yeah

locked in mentally, tiger stripe eyes

Creaking heart, fizz bubble bottle opening

trying to slow down the eagle swoop around and round of the clock hand

breathe

breathe

I remember bracken landscape

feet in cold water, fragmented reflection of my young face

confusion looking back at me

swirl my feet round, kick up sediment

watch my face spin

Now I move ever slow, ever fast

past signs, indications and vindication

A brain with wiring done wrong

neutral into live, screws not tightly in

chiselling away at miles, one million beats of my heart

no chance to reminisce

Hold on just a little longer

please

if not for you, for me

I need that softness, that comfort, your heartbeat

When you leave (it used to be if, now it’s when)

what will you feel and see in your final heartbeat on earth?

will it be a flashlight from the past, the smile and comfort of a loved one?

or a glimpse of a shining future could’ve been

When your last breath falls out, a final sigh

did you find comfort or salvation?

was there a moment where you felt ‘aha’

did you see the gentle translucent figures of ghosts past in the corner

willing you in?

Did you try, just for a wispy moment

to not take their hand?

Was the pull slight and weak, or did it draw you in like the spiral down in a water slide

into kaleidoscope dreams, a candy field

Could you hear everything, like a pin drop or a butterfly heartbeat?

did the entire universe stop, did the world stop doing its stupid dumb spinning dance

just for you

just for your final moment

Was me being two minutes late a generous act of blue sky fate

or did I also fail, did I stumble and hesitate just long enough

Was my quick-pace-but-scared intent too little too late?

did I enter just in time to miss the calm chaos + the room spinning

Or maybe I wasn’t to be

that moment wasn’t mine to share

Amber-then-red-stay where you are, stay

Only wanted me to see the still, when gentle beats stop

but I could sense it still you know

sense the escape, the exit, the finality to it all

if you were a butterfly I’d sense that final slow, lazy yawn of your wings dropping to the ground

to rest

to peace

to white cotton wool foggy sky

And those drifting vibrations of change, of time, of you

still resonate and falter and yearn and influence

all these years

later

later

sometimes ebbing into nothing, just a gentle glow, red LED in the dark

like

I’m here, still here

just gently

Then other times, beat beat

old photos, scent of old books in attic, black & white history

a sense of you, who you were, who you shaped me to be

If only I could zoom out so, so so so far in the universe

I could just simply look back, zoom in on you

in your favorite space and position in time and the universe

and you’d still be there

sun shine, smiles, no sense of

impending loss

But I’d be so far away, too far away to capture it

I’d reach out knowing I can never grasp that moment again.

They say the flap of a butterfly wing causes tiny changes with such vast impacts

But when I look at this red/black flitter flutter flapper I see no echo, no ripped effect

crossing times, years, countries and space

just a dull reflection in the muddy water below me

my face bending distorted through time trust and memories

Flash back to a childhood home, a memory once encased and sealed

now silently slowly corroding and rusting without remedy

my heart beats faster then slower, easy now, easy

plant a seed, watch it die, wither

some things better left buried

There’s a ripple wind blowing right through me, wrapping itself around each bone until they ache

A constant reminder of time, of memories increasingly out of focus

looking up from the murky waters of now, through a periscope, through colours to above and the pasrt

And I’m scanning around to find you on the beach, gentle smile, hair blowing in the early summer breeze

it’s so tangible, I can, I can… I can’t

and I see scattered remnants of letters, of love, of hope, of promise

being swayed and persuaded and pushed by the winds of time

they’re in tiny pieces now, so fragmented I could never piece together the word or letters

they’re blowing in the wind now

And I turn my face back to you but you’ve nearly gone, fading until just a whisper of smoke

I blink again and you’re gone. It’s all gone.
I see only rust, broken down industrial building, nature desperately trying to cling to it, to rebuild

and I realise I have nothing to cling to

empty air in my hands

I’d make a fist but what’s the point

and that light? that gentle reminder blink<>blink<>blink?

it’s so far away now I might just be imagining it.

that if I close my eyes so hard and press on them I’ll see stars and it’s your light

But I know it isn’t, it can’t be

it’s the vast deception of my mind, a decaying grey mass I call me

The hard-wired habitual loneliness of one night

Safely contained in one room [door bolted]

There’s a perverseness in the safety I feel

I mean it’s not safe

Lonely isn’t safe

It’s grey-wooly-can’t get out

It’s not a gilded lullaby sung to me as a wide-eyed child

Not the comfort of a warm embrace in winter

Lonely offering safety is lying to me

Lonely knows I know that

Lonely knows I know they know that

It offers joyous solicitude, quiet, peace, hear-the-clouds-moving-in-the-breeze

But delivers stillness, sadness, stifling to get air in a hot room

Sometimes I don’t know what I’m craving

The buoyancy and agility of a speedboat on the glitter of some sea abroad pock-marked with sun specks

Or the emptiness of a breeze through a valley where no-one treads

It’s the not knowing

The changing, flip-flopping, push up then shove down

The fragility of brittle glass being hammered by a storm

The lack of stability, of golden contentment

Watching the shadow of some ancient sun-dial move fast, faster, faster still

Day into night into day, circadian

I’m stood static in the middle of the scene

Colour of city scene around me fast-forwarded

All this there and I can’t grasp it

Because I reach [out] to touch it feel it experience it

And all I feel is air [or maybe sand] slipping between fingers

Slips away into cracks and crevices, imagined hills and valleys

Slips off from me as it has nothing tangible to hold on to

Winds away into the river, into the ocean

Where the drop of something turns into a blue-black mass of disarray

Like it never touched or knew me

—

I’m not sure I’ve ever known real sunshine or vibrancy

Was it just sugar-sweet-sickly-coated dreams that one sunrise brought

Was it just the vulgar gloom-aggression of the storm that day

Am I just frittering, flitting, fanciful

imagining some neon-bright, ultra-vivid dreamscape where I

walk, jump, dance, fly into the night

absorbed completely with nothing to frighten me

—

Did I tell you I once felt the wind go through me, like every molecule felt it

Did I tell you I once felt the leaves in the tree make movements so small in the air yet I felt them tickle ever atom in me

Did I tell you I once felt birth, life and death all in one beautiful, fractured azure day

That just for one second, minute when time stood still

just me air, the universe, the glittery promise of my next breath

how it felt like everything in that moment

everything

Did I tell you I understood, I understood how everything worked and came together

That there’s gold, glitter, shine, an unspoken whisper of unity and solace

Did I tell you for that tiny fraction, that tiny soft silver fragment of time

that it all made sense

—

but then quickly [like a sun setting on fast forward x 100] it went

it left me

and it left me so confused, so empty

Like I’d been touched so gently so powerfully

that I felt it there after for so long

but not long enough

Did I tell you how I craved that crystalline clarity of knowing

knowing for sure, with summer-day sureness and conviction

of what life meant

of what I mean and will have meant

—

If only, oh if only I could explain

how the light feels

how the darkness feels

how they entrap me and entwine me, every fibre of my being

kidding me I’m in control or sated

with the inevitability of the impact of a no-grace fall

with the absolute certainty there is no clarity, no magic-pill

—

But I felt it still

head to toe to head

Felt it fizzle up like static

wind its way through my soul

and then it left.

After 112,892 rabbit holes

Body zapping me awake over and over and over

Color all gone to monochrome

Heart rate raised but entirely useless

Dopamine all wrung out and dried in the sun

Thinking of 100 different ways to piece together one million fragments

Using no glue or tools or skills or reference or assistance

And just staring at them laid there on the floor

Some shiny in the sun, some dulled with dust, some just beyond repair

Thinking to myself, how do I piece these together so this time they just stick?

How do I take all these fragments, make them whole but make them strong?

And maybe I can’t

Maybe I’m chasing a strength I can’t have or figure out

Maybe there are so many hairline cracks that one day I’ll just

shatter

and just be looking up to the sky, evaluating and over-analysing the way the clouds are moving above me

Maybe it’s so fragile I’ll just

smash into countless pieces

and then at least have some integrity of not pretending I’m not a mess

gradually decaying and becoming one with the ground, the soil, the earth

just a speck of dust that caught your eye when it reflected in the sun

just for that split of a split-second moment

then the angle of the sunlight changes

and I retreat into shadow

It all feels very, very sudden.

Like when there’s a storm, when it’s raining and raining and raining and it suddenly stops.

I’ve got all these years and years of memories of you.

To be honest, they’re slipping away like sand through my fingers.

I felt you move on to another stage today.

I could see it in the sky and I could sense it in the air.

I can sense it in the ground underneath my feet.

That passing on of heritage, of history, of family and love.

Or maybe it was just my mind playing tricks.

Maybe it was me trying to find meaning in the rainbow I saw.

I don’t know, maybe it was you, maybe it was you both.

And that’s where it’s confusing, right? –

the ambiguity, the chaos, the not knowing.

So now you’re gone, I just have to find beauty in the confusion.

After holding on to the thousands of memories I have.

Knowing that someday, when I pass, those memories will pass too.

I want to table the idea of destiny and its lack of guidance and will

Grey sky behind me in the photo, yet smiling, so sure

You in the photo with the sea behind you

It’s slipped away [moments]

I want to curtail the way my memories pass through my fingers like sand from some beach I went to so long ago

To be able to nurture them, immerse myself in them no matter how cold or warm

Put the most important ones in a box only I have the key to

Put it away somewhere safe

I want to stop wondering what if this and that

That cruel torment and rumination of a billion and one futures that may or may not have been

If a photo could tell a story, looking back I don’t imagine it would have been an epic novel

More of a short story, something immersive yes, but a short story still.

Let me stop you [there] because right now I can’t focus on outside, on that fragmented rain that beats down [me down]

Helter skelter rushing pounding me into submission

I need a minute an hour a day. Who knows – maybe more [much more]

There’s no letup from the frantic fanatic fantastic thoughts plowing the land of my brain into famine

If I put a hand out to steady myself it might just pause and become static
& wilt
& stop

If I reach out to catch this feeling it might be heavy [too heavy], I think I might break
I’m worried if I bring this scene into focus like some bizarre director’s cut it will be real

Round & round the garden [like a, a what?]
Up, down, all around, shaken with the sound

Perhaps the next day normal service will resume & the sun’s rays will split me open until all the amber disintegrates

Perhaps I’ll be delayed a day or two. Leaves on the track; train stuck at the station

If I’m honest with you and let you peer inside at my mind like it’s a dolls’ house you might see odd shapes, colours, sounds. Bizarre sights like a sideshow

What would you think? Do you zoom in, macro focus, high-res?

From here it’s pixelated, fuzzy, kaleidoscope that’s gone wrong, left out in the rain too long [silly billy]

Put my hand over the end of it to cover up the light – perhaps what’s left is a couple of leaking shards of artificial sun trying to keep me awake [+ from drowning]

Is this a scene of control [of farce?] [of an ending?]

Sorry, time to go [we march on]