But I can see in them something of my father.

Uncles, home on leave during the war.

At three or four, I loved those straightbacked men

Towering above me, smiling and confident.

The whole world before them. Or so it seemed.

I look at my boys, slouched in armchairs

They have outgrown. See Tom in army uniform

And Finn in air force blue. Time is up.

Bearhugs. They lift me off my feet

And fifty years fall away. One son

After another, crushing the life into me.

Defying Gravity

Gravity is one of the oldest tricks in the book.

Let go of the book and it abseils to the ground

As if, at the centre of the earth, spins a giant yo-yo

To which everything is attached by an invisible string.

Tear out a page of the book and make an aeroplane.

Launch it. For an instant it seems that you have fashioned

A shape that can outwit air, that has slipped the knot.

But no. The earth turns, the winch tightens, it is wound in.

One of my closest friends is, at the time of writing,

Attempting to defy gravity, and will surely succeed.

Eighteen months ago he was playing rugby,

Now, seven stones lighter, his wife carries him aw-

Kwardly from room to room. Arranges him gently

Upon the sofa for the visitors. ‘How are things?’

Asks one, not wanting to know. Pause. ‘Not too bad.’

(Open brackets. Condition inoperable. Close brackets.)

Soon now, the man that I love (not the armful of bones)

Will defy gravity. Freeing himself from the tackle

He will sidestep the opposition and streak down the wing

Towards a dimension as yet unimagined.

Back where the strings are attached there will be a service

And homage paid to the giant yo-yo. A box of left-overs

Will be lowered into a space on loan from the clay.

Then, weighted down, the living will walk wearily away.

The Man in the Moon

On the edge of the jumping-off place I stood

Below me, the lake

Beyond that, the dark wood

And above, a night-sky that roared.

I picked a space between two stars

Held out my arms, and soared.

The journey lasted not half a minute

There is a moon reflected in the lake

You will find me in it.

6

The Elements

Oxygen

I am the very air

you breathe

Your first

and last

breath

I welcomed you

at birth

Shall bid

farewell

at death

I am the Kiss of Life

Its ebb and flow

With your last gasp

You will call my name:

‘o o o o o o o o’

Nitrogen

‘O’ is for Oxygen

so gregarious

whereas I am

colourless

odourless

and tasteless

unattractive you might say

unreactive in every way

nitrogen: the night

to oxygen’s day

I am 75 per cent

of the air you breathe

so keep me clean

For when I latch on

to fumes that cars exhaust

I am poison

Nitro-glycerine

that’s me as well Dynamite