III

usually I love this

early morning looks like late afternoon

public house boilers wearily breathing

steam across foggy bus stops

the roads laying down like old men

scraps in their gutters

banks and shops are closed

and I feel alone on the pavement

for the first time in my life

as winter grumbles its way to a growl

I want to be somewhere else

somewhere warm

howler

this morning

when I was lost in the house,

outside somewhere

a dog was howling

I knew how he felt

This Strange Fog

This strange fog

is visiting again

Making my lungs flinch

but my heart leap

as it drifts across the moon

Like its cousin snow

it brings a new perspective to old things

Disappearing corners

and inventing dead ends

While it is hard to see,

this change clears my mind

Alfie

There is a storm coming,

gale and black

My body and its cloak both dubious,

this morning’s coffee making me shake

I am a frail kid

I look into the ever-lit bedroom of a stranger

(always passed at night, weaving

It is like a lighthouse

telling me I am near home)

feeling bad for a second

as there is a woman in the window

A perfect long blonde Alfie,

I am a pariah,

but she smiles

and pokes her wide pink tongue at me

I fill all up like the dirty shaded eternal burning bulb

and feel much better

Shadows

I remember my best friend,

who left when I was ten, said

“If you see a shadow

  and there’s no one around,

  you are in the presence of a ghost”

Well,

these days I see a lot of shadows

when there’s nobody home