Recital

I sang tonight. But I sang very badly. And I wondered�
am I doing the right thing? An old lady sat opposite
me, closing her eyes habitually� later on telling me
of her life, and she seemed so tired. She seemed so
sick of being helpless� oh, the pastor�s wife telling
her little kids that �the lady walks with a walking
ring, like you did when you were a baby�. God, my GOD!
I could�ve screamed in rage

(and indeed I did later that night)

is there no respect, or dignity? Is there no way I
could help, or something I could say? The words
perpetually turning to the immediate, to what is here
and now. And when the others left, and it was me and
her, she talked of her dead husband and her beautiful
house far away � reservedly, because she�s been told
it�s boring so many times before (or so I believe).
And my thoughts dried up, because my world and hers
are indescribably far apart. I sang, and the others
sang, and it was finished�

�and I got in my car, and breathed faster and faster,
overcome by every dark emotion in existence, my body
wanting to weep for all the pain in this life, for all
the loss, and all the hurt, and all the impossibly
tragic people. Breathing faster and faster, till the
pale yellow moon and the gilded sky heard my deeply
wounded cry.

Once more the need to be held.

I saw myself in the mirror and thought �more and more
who I want to be, more and more who I want to be�. The
moment stretched out across time like the sun�s
fingers tickling the dozy hills with strips of light.
It was something different in a country that�s usually
dark.

Ah well, I write for myself, don�t I? So I lavishly
apply adjectives with the utmost tenderness. I have no
editor to answer to. Hope you don't get lost in there
somewhere...

It's 11pm, and I wonder where you are, and what you're
doing. It's this time, this... specific space in
time... little wedge of chronology and sensual being
when I just need to be "deeply and longingly held".

Oh I should get to bed. The world might need a saviour
tomorrow... and bar that, it might politely request my
company. I wish you were here to tell me it'll be OK. I think,
coming from your lips, I might just believe it.