A case can be made
for bookshops known to stock
vistas of desolation: long hills,
swamps, barren sand, the bone-white
charm of a lost wallet.
I like the fresher breeze,
the way you lift up your hands
and tell me you know where you are.
All this we burned or traded. The bills,
the paycheques. A stereo speaker, the new dishwasher.
A radio, always present like a limp body
at the bottom of one of the meaner lakes.
I should be grateful for the noise, the smell of gas.
If you’re smart you’ll dowse yourself in it
as if that was all there was…
But that wasn’t enough – we moved
off College, just north of the noise
trying to make sense of, not regret, exactly,
its copper trap, but the way a fluke bull’s-eye
in a dirty pub slipped by unproved.
It has its attractions, but.
We flicked our butts and later
crossed the whole thing out.