nostalgia

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

 

 

Aurora

 

remember emerald grass

and the hot sky zinging

above a field laid out

to the left of a train line

a cloth unfurled

that curls to a valley

steep-walled with bergs

feels like the bluegreen ocean

in that it’s hard to know

whether the strongest desire

is to be in it, or observe

back once again

emotions shot through with

brine-cool air from outside

the world full of birds

and vines across the window

like it’s been a hundred years

Autumn again

Photo: Claire Doble

 

the nostalgia of street corners

so ordinary and familiar

little things that stack up to life

one step, step, step

day after day

years, even

and in autumn

when everything’s dying off after abundance

I weep

over a final mundane journey

ragged leaves scuffing my way

a boy outgrown/ growing up

a closing door

era’s end

and like a film, it’s golden in there

that final crack of light

glowing yellowbrick road curling

back to the recent past

even the tough times

I know. I knew, I know

how shit things were/are/were

but they’re already bathed

in the liquidamber of sealed memory

the beauty

of inaccessibility (don’t ever change!)

and what if I’m only now getting used

to accepting the seasons

and it’s all starting to make sense

and I could relax into it

just about

feel the lull of acceptance

a way life could be?

—

and I know every other fucking poet

said it already

but this is mine

 

Photo: Claire Doble