Put The Kettle On

I live by moments
by seconds
one minute it's there
then it isn't
but don't let that stop you from starting,
or ending
the boiling of water
that you forgot about while I was gone
but not forgetting.
because I live by these moments, as do you,
with the constants- dragging you by the hair- that you've been growing out for our wedding--
ever forward

And so you slept in the car
or pretended to, I couldn't tell (and I laughed)
but that time was not lost
though you spent it forgetting,
(like a name you can't remember, or never learned)
and got home to a house
spitting back
acrid black jam
on toast with coffee...
while you had tea, or intended to, elsewhere-
and spent time forgetting
and sewing the lace
to cover your hair at our wedding.

The Giants Are Coming

The airiness of life,
the light, as it were,
fluttered in and hung itself lazily in the trees.
To be described later as a flicker in the kerosene lanterns
then the bumping of heads in a mine shaft
then as the talkie took your notice, curl a come-hither finger, dripping with the true honey that is temptation on the projection screen
even then, as boxes whizzing down the carbon production line,
each one forsaking each one before it, forsaking each one before it, forsaking each one before it-
but this is the beginning of all that.

Then there was the walk to the beach.
climbing gingerly down the face of time and gravity
to see
the kayaks on the shore, two heads bobbing,
then shoulders,
then shirtless, bare breasts
then the mindless stare as i turned to leave
but, not, too fast.

as i looked back-
the monarchs of time stood idly by
while our perpetuality-
{and my understanding of it}-
surrounded me
and stared me down.