THE GOOD THINGS
A grey and heavy Tuesday
sprawls to the horizon;
the window might open onto a courtyard
filled with colour and life,
but never does. I want to drive a nail
deep into the clouds
and hang a bright canvas across the sky –
a crinkled hymn to day and night –
but try as we might, we’d always know
that the moon is just a lump of wood,
the sun a crumbling dried flower
and the stars only shiny little stones
hanging by loops of string
from the spindly branches of a tree.
We see ourselves as reflections
smudged in the back of a spoon,
two changing people in the same clothes each day,
so we rush on like open razors,
cutting open all the things that could have held us
while we grab a feeling or two
from a book as we pass by.
Now there’s noise in the courtyard,
but the spoon needs washing
and the brittle sun slowly drops a petal.
S.C. Flynn 