In the photo I sometimes imagine her lifting

we’re shivering and damp at our desks

with towels around our shoulders.

That was the time we dressed as pirates

and set sail across the playground pond.

Kids, you know, kids …

Sometimes she wore a big red scarf

and claimed she was descended from gypsies.

She said her father had a black moustache

and a room where he kept bad children.

We didn’t believe her. One day she said

she would miss our lovely faces. We didn’t

believe her – we were kids off farms.

Another day she said she was dying

so would we please all smile. Click.

She said the camera was there to record

how we hardly ever changed our clothes.

Mr Woodhead came to take her place

and now I miss that old grey jersey.

76

The Sky

The sky thinks it is a flock of birds.

Then it thinks it is a cloud.

It also thinks it is widespread words.

Sometimes it looks up at the stars,

imagining other skies,

and sometimes down at the water

where it thinks it sees more stars.

At such times it believes itself to be a god.

But no such luck, poor sky! Soon enough

it is saying hello sir and madam

what a nice day it’s turning out to be

and can you perhaps spare a dollar,

thank you, thank you kindly. The sky

can still hold a small cloud in its hands.

Today it does so, and it rains.

It held our old home that way, too,

awkward and vertical and cold –

the snow caught fire as each day died.

But yes, it is safer here on the flat.

A man comes by with coal in a wheelbarrow,

muttering, muttering. He wants

to sell us warmth, his feet don’t leave the ground.

We think that we will always miss the sky.

It says look up whenever we look down.

77

Change Nothing

I used to race up the mountain

and swim across the lake;

then right back home again

entirely underwater.

Also I used to make up stories –

just my way of getting through the day.

In fact I mostly did nothing.

I’ve heard it said the one true thing

is what you almost believe in.

These days I take it as read:

the peak and the shore just out of reach

(there they are now), and I tell you

once you’re tired you’re fucking exhausted.

78

Like

Omens and similes sing together

like two dark birds in darkening weather

until the sky is a single darkness there

self-knitted to the sea

where waves produce more waves

like you, like me

who travel by stamping on the waves.

See how we hit them hard, the waves,

sailing across our sad backyard

to shores we’ve never heard of.

We’re hoping to find a friend, a pal,

a bodyguard …

though Homer is always hopeless if you need a feed,