Month: January 2023

Heimweh

Photo: Claire Doble

the tongue is more sensitive than fingers

teeth shift and move

into more conventional spaces

do teeth have a morality

or is it just vanity?

on a perfect yellow morning

kookaburras outside my window

laugh at me for leaving

and I ache not to go

heimweih

feels like family

sunwarm and delightful

sense of

remembered yearning

from living overseas

all those years

crammed into my niche

missing Switzerland

where I could be anyone

recently

a stranger reassured me

I’m better now

content here

in another heartplace

fitting almost perfectly

conventional

with a kink

do teeth have a morality

or is it just vanity

 

 

tide / goodbye

you couldn’t invent the tide

or the blood in my eye

imagine creating

a land

where waves

rushed in

once a day

then left

sand

like the bare spot on your chin

I see from one side

and wonder if anyone

else has spied

do you feel that

something

between us,

the sea and the sky?

or are the pebbles in my mind

worn too smooth by

tumbling

endless thoughts

washing nigh

turning over and over and

the way they

swell and subside

not even a hangnail

to catch certainty

just a shallow

goodbye

Summer

her first album

I was back from

Switzerland

calling Melbourne

quite often

listening

catching

the train

on up the coast

on Fridays

 

randomly

I fell

in a moment

unexpected

but so vintage-sweet

 

my cardigan

under the bed

where

your handcuffs

held my grief

that weekend

(he died)

 

and now there’s

a new album

it repeats on

and on and on

her voice

a yearning

for another

happening

 

do I welcome

love now?

summer’s here

again, again, again

 

 

Soundcloud recording of this poem: https://on.soundcloud.com/65nRL

 

Photo: Claire Doble