Saturday, January 17, 2009

slowly unfolding certainties


In spite of the fatigue that nearly always follows, I do love to work in the small hours, often till dawn. To pause every now and then, drink a cup of tea, take a book from the poetry shelf, at random, open it and find little gems like this:


Folded message

All I've got is one eye and two brains
to love you with and I'm so concerned
especially at night for your peace
since the directions are uncertain
meagre and costly for two as for one
but to the tune of a progressive reluctance
we shall one day attain some kind of summit
don't you think? These are verifiable things:
that in the presence of two hundred screaming
aircraft known as 'the future' our slowly
unfolding certainties keep us upright
even in the pitch dark while the alarm clock
in my chest keeps me gentle, where
would you be about now?


Peter Riley, Passing Measures: A Collection of Poems (Manchester: Carcanet, 2000), p. 96.

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