To be two cats

This day won’t need much to improve,
there’s already light at four in the morning,
I’ve got coffee, a read.

Two cats, with eyes closed and probably purring,
are rolling over the pavement outside,
catching the warmth of some early sunbeams,
then falling asleep on top of each other.

They let the blackbird be ignored
so he can sing his morning song.
How much more can a day need.

Finished my coffee and my read,
I close my eyes and am just that:
a cat or two in the warmth of sunlight.

Breadcrumbs

Sharing bread together as we walk
sometimes I lose you out of sight,
the birds show me where you have been.

I see you limited by what I can,
you watch me and you see the surface,
sometimes our minds meet in a dungeon.

Days go by, we speak but say nothing,
yet, in what is unspoken, I find you.
I now don’t need words to read your mind.

Every word we say means: be here with me,
I don’t want to lose you over death.
We talk to keep track of each other.

I shall always look for the breadcrumbs
that you leave behind on the road;
their meaning in every conversation.

With open eyes

Even with my eyes open the other world invades,
distracting me from what is real. A daydream takes over:
A cornflower field, and red poppies, buttercups,
or an imagined house, with lots of space,
old and mysterious. Kittens, pups, a face. A face.

To sail away I think a sailing ship,
leaving port, losing the cobwebs of the mind.
She goes steady in the wind, the sea is blue,
I wonder what she leaves behind.
And approving smiles show up. A hand on a shoulder.

Sometimes I daydream about you, how it would be,
and all meets up, the best of useless dwellings
is when you sail towards me while I wait
in the meadow near that house,
the best yet to come. With my eyes open to see.

Doing dishes

Her worry moment is doing dishes
when her children pass her mind one by one,
every dirty plate another problem
she rinses quickly. The crockery floats,
tea cups seem boats on a foamy ocean
but she won’t get distracted. She rinses.
The knives are the first to come out shining,
stains can go if the effort is thorough.

She sees possibilities. Another school?
Next the spoons and forks emerge brightly too.
But the plates need a soak. Her thoughts ponder.
Money is tight, she will be creative.
Ideas of how to make money come by.
The water spirals its way in the sewer,
she is done, she had a good think. Some new
dirty cups already pile up in the sink.

The view

This view is not our lives, but seen from here
we might be part of it. The niceness of
the dancing trees, the clouds, birds going by:
we search each other, trying to be so.

The brick wall keeps us apart from sunshine,
indoors is more darkness, more of the raw
than the roses, the pansies, the rainbow.
The room is filled with books of world war two.

The tv screen shows horror movies, blood,
words we said keep echoing in silence,
the photos of the loved ones cracked one day,
a dog has died here, some wounds were treated.

But outside a night-bird finds a tune now.
The sun sets with more than expected warmth,
so pink and red, more gracious than we are.
The view is of us. It’s what we saw go.

Summer morning

Pale the day has started out, in watercolours
wearing see-through thoughts that please.
I can see you here, your smile, more so:
your laugh. The fire of the sun just touch and go,
transparency, the kinder side of day.

Then clouds move over and the sky is hard and blue,
a plastic lid that covers what is true,
a tender whisper can’t make it here for long,
any subtle gesture wasted on too much of it all,
on the false brightness of Summer.

Suddenly all changes again, now rain is falling hard.
Where does this leave us? Give me a clue
before the plot thickens as mist erasing you,
before the paleness of the morning is forgotten,
when all was clear to me and real.

Fixing

Severely into the matter you stand,
bowing for the child with the broken toy.
I like you so much now, and your welcomed help,
your fixing expertise coming to use
as you mend the wheel of the bright red car.

Twirling leaves gather around you both now
to keep this moment fixated in mind.
Maybe one day you can fix some old cracks,
big gaps, loose ends, us both. For now this toy
is my hope that all will once be mended.

Small proof

I don’t want so much from life
now I know a little of the taste of fruits,
somewhat of the love that’s friendship,
much of my own imperfection,
and most about what life has not in store for me.

I ask for small proof that I matter,
yet even little things are not for me,
I don’t know why. The fruit tastes bitter.

Mildly

Days go by mildly now,
your scent has left the building
and the weather might improve at last.
I can not complain too much.
Days go by mildly now.

We did some universal stuff at times,
remember, like watching a full moon
and making love on a bed with rose petals
but in my memories
those moments have a kitschy flair.

There was a goodbye in every sentence,
even the items on the table
that were there silently,
seemed to scream it out:
Over. Over. Over.
A scissor made me think of pain.

I shall take the kitschy moments
to remember you by mildly,
but not yet. As for a while
I need the pain to understand.
I put the items in a drawer
and clean the table with my tears.

Funeral oration

Looking into the Earth
where the coffin will soon take you down
I try to imprint every grain
as this is where your body will be from now on
for the time it takes to fall back into elements
that need no soul.

But yourself are not here,
where have you gone to my friend.
Something of you will stay with me and others
until we in our turn drop dead. A chain.
Parts of what dead people were
remains in dead people to be.

Standing by a grave
never makes me feel better
about nature and the sense of it all.
On the graveyard a woodpecker
machineguns all thoughts down
that could be appropriate.

I suck at funerals, but you knew that.