The Locals

I spend

so much of my trips

to other countries

trying to not to look

and act like a tourist.

I hang where the locals hang.

I eat where the locals eat.

I even find a place to stay

where the locals live.

Yet everyone I come across

says to me,

“You’re not from around

here are you.”

They join me in a selfie.

As a traveller

I’m a work in progress.

The Lovers Of An Early Spring

Should we settle for crocus and snow.

one lingering,

one ahead of itself?

And share earthworms,

nested eggs

a hard sleepy soil?

Can we be so inapposite

and yet find the will to share?

Would we chill

through the night

and yet wake up flowering?

This Close

In this world there’s one I love

I fear

who does not speak of wine and sex,

is more of a handywoman than I,

has a quick mind

and knows something about fishing.

There’s still this great American love affair

out there in the world –

there always is –

but what if it is as close to home

as the lawn sprinklers,

the leaf-blowers,

of my neighbourhood.

So much light,

sometimes it’s good to have

a tunnel at the end of it –

a safe place

which, despite its confines,

someone’s already living there.