Poem
There’s a still point in the afternoon
when the cross-eyed dogs
in the smudged pet-shop window
are a distraction:
Underneath everything we touch is the smell
Of something too obvious to express
And yet we say there is nothing, nothing at all.
We met at the end of the party
when all the lights were fouled
with drink and even the self-titled
Ouzo Animal was yawning in protest
The day the UFO stopped below the esplanade,
they interrupted the war for an ad break.
In the half-light, we walk through woodlands that keep lost
children and old stones, shadowed by pines that seem to breathe
small prayers into the wind. Joggers weave silently around
tombstones like night creatures and we stare at them like ex-
Scoring forty-nine flesh wounds in sixty-five episodes, federal agent Mark Sterling
and Soviet superspy Vladimir Volkov faced off in five seasons of Checkmate!,
cheeky Cold War television thriller, two foes united in mutual personal respect
and marrow-deep loathing for the ideals of the other. Who could have known
In their crucibles they attempt a new kind of tea
every day, usually through a combination of
Methods, such as the fox method, the hydrangea
method and the sunlight method this is a colour-
As flown from orange sunset, over mountain-
shaded sea, at eventide. As boats
are drawn in, sails begin to undress, or arrive anxious,
fully bare-masted. Fishermen navigate reeds