Memoirs of a Life Unlived

His lips clamp around the straw like there's petrol to drain. She knows he's glancing at her - both are - despite that solid staring at their phones we all do. The part of her that knows they care she's cordoned off; she'll need the space. Not tragic, because most come back, but sad because this table scene is sure to be the best they'll have for years.

Handful of sweets like teeth launched straight into his open mouth makes you wince: head flipped back -  trilby glued on - and all over in no time. Back to the broken nose you first saw; and the glare. Looking around won't help -  how nerves work is his living. His thoughts aren't many but they're stark and made for this. Have to hope something happens out of a dream: He loses interest and leaves. Close your eyes like life won't end.

His face is monstrous. Locked beneath the surface, Reshaping constantly, He seems about to speak. Patches of oil slip past And blur his features. Sunlight heaves colours From the monochrome. You wonder who loved him. Did he ever wake From this dream? His hair swims, beautiful.

It’s absurd to imagine That my death, all this mess, will one day be Commemoration, a tidy object. Yes, I know that’s life and memory But this – my death, my end of everything – Subsumed into fact like concrete hardening So that in a year, ten years, one hundred, This strange tree, my shallow breathing Will be writing on granite, and silences. The sun’s rising and soon those clouds Will meet it. It will be sunny somewhere And cloudy in other places. 11 th November 2018

But I’m trying not to let you go Further into wilderness. Signs and tarmac yield to unmade roads, Paring down to tracks, gates, fields And beyond, where trees peter out, Those featureless moors You walked as a youth From tor to tor, head down on the upslope, Lost in the joy of emptiness, That brain you hate running clear. I’ll keep fewer tabs on you now Because you’re not yourself and so You won’t miss what you don’t know. Cowardly and distracted I'll never appreciate The absence of difficulty. Do you know but can't express That all this is because of me? What a thing to hold on to When you're unravelling!

in memoriam John Edward Cole Ninety one; if it were candles We couldn't picture them, Your cake would last for weeks. You moved through days racked up as history: Huge wars, new bombs and ways to talk - Nerves and confusion tainting the map. You made ninety but there wasn't cake. Late seventies you thought you were - Not stolen but rearranged. Brothers and sisters back from the dead. When mum walked out it broke my heart; She was scattered in the garden all along. My expectations were spinning plates. Each conversation was a slightly different man, Baking cakes in my head until the news came.