October’s Language

Rupert Loydell

 

Strange Overtones

It is the earliest work we revisit most,
whenever it’s on display. Nobody eats
in the pub anymore since you went away.

The secret to quiet is to not think about it.
If you let noise in then life takes up the pulse
and your turning circle immediately shrinks

as every particle’s energised and shakes itself
awake. I have copied the music you wanted
but have not got an address to send it to.

The guitar has detuned nicely, I am surprised
each time I try to play. I like the concept
of unprepared music now I’ve thought of it.

No more songs: life is long and I have had
my fill. I ain’t never giving in but there aren’t
enough hours left in the day, or days until I die.

In the road movie of my life I am parked up,
watching the cars go by, trying to remember
the earth is a flower and that nobody wants

a lonely heart. I am in the habit of silence,
of closing my eyes during sleep, but now
it has been suggested that love comes back

to try again if only we stay awake at all times,
stride out of the dreamtime into the image
of the one, with eyes in focus and mind at rest,

ready to be broken and then mended. I make do
with rests and catnaps, your bruised and smeared
self-portraits green and purple in my mind.

 

This is Where You End

for James

Cheap factory sorrow, produced on demand.
‘Quilting and pillows,’ insists my three year old
in the Rothko room, ‘quilting and pillows.’

But I see blood, a long corridor into despair
where processions often take place
and there is a concentration to brightness.

At the end of the line a smudge of light,
reports of tunnels and angel choirs singing.
Shadow catchers wait to break your fall

and steal your dreams, the paintings
did not impress. The colour itself
has not stayed true, is now a different hue,

and it is impossible to date the language
or intent. Constant negotiation is required
to disrupt mystery and focus on the current show.

Listening again to the past it is clear the boys
were ahead of themselves and deserve to be
revisited. Broken writing and remixed tracks

do not do them justice, are just lost sensations
glimpsed across the room. The music has
an urge for going, was last seen over there;

today it is the sound of now, stumbling awkwardly
as time pauses or pools away. I try to remember
the tiniest of moments, the sudden unkempt tunes

you played in the living room. I could be doing
something else but the landscape has changed
just as I have gone to ground in a place

you never knew, where monotone rain is broken
only by squares of painted colour on the wall
and tiny echoes from my personal stereo.

 

Borrowed Time

In the spring I sometimes felt like getting up early
and painting, tweaking a poem or two into shape
over a cup of coffee, then making toast for everyone

at the normal time. Now, I’m claiming back the hour
that someone borrowed, soon it will be dark before
I drive home from work. I’m not a mirror to myself,

but sometimes I know just how I feel. I’ve run out
of words and inclinations, wonder what on earth
I am doing here. Nothing ever seems quite right

and my little girl has to like it or lump it: stay with
her friends or branch out on her own at another
local school. As recession bites, we change our tune

and learn to sing for our supper. The pub is full
of strangers doing the quiz we didn’t want to enter;
seems we’ve got the question wrong and don’t

understand the given answer. I turn over and over
in my mind this outmoded style of living,
the relationship between ourselves and others.

There is no place here for simile or metaphor, we must
exploit the intimacy between experience and self.
You would be forgiven for thinking I didn’t exist at all.

 
Be Serious

It’s easy being right on, harder working hard
when you’d rather be at home, growing up
late and trying to stay alive. Outside,

the roads go to you and where we used
to live. Now there is only endless scenery
and a wish for something more. I lay

my ear to the furious night and watch you
breathe and sleep. I never lose, not really,
am ready for October’s language to fall

into place. Doors open the other way
as harvest is taken home. I’m still
waiting for an intelligent response.

© Rupert M Loydell