Dice black and white
Not looking for a fight
Lucky hands, grip tight
Wanting a winning sight
Put pair into flight
Fist raised, power, and might
Snake eyes say good night
Tables rock theirs souls
with families, friends and children
I sit alone at mine
and I watch their laughter and smiles
It started with me opening the restaurant door
pacing my steps
and then saying to the hostess
‘Table for one’
I now order my unsweetened iced tea
and watch the waitress
remove the other place settings;
An empty chair is my friend tonight
Comfort food; meatballs and spaghetti
is what I order
I fiddle with my phone
as conversation has abandoned me
How many times have I cried
sitting alone
to believe that once in my lifetime
… I was loved
Upon me, I have seen so many things come and go,
from my creation to my extinction.
I’ve seen plates come and go,
I’ve seen tempers flare,
I’ve seen asses come and go,
I’ve seen centuries pass.
I’ve seen hands come and go,
I’ve seen wings take flight,
I’ve seen declarations made,
I’ve seen people part ways.
You've outgrown this dim room of mould
ceiling's peeling, walls are cracked and cold
get a room with view and broom
table for chats via zoom
live without control, equally bold —
Dining al fresco
when the weather is warm
in the summer months
here is the norm
but Mr Khayyam said it best
'A book of verses underneath the bough,
a jug of wine, a loaf of bread
and thou...'
as eating outdoors
flavours taste finer
and there with my lady-love
I'll wine and dine her
Excerpt from Rubáiyát by Omar Khayyam (1048—1131)
aged and withering
family gatherings seen
many miles to go
Talk is expensive, silence is cheap
Silence is shade, talk is light
Silence is cocktail you silently sip
Drifting away through the night
The car door slams shut, bags carried out
Nobody’s waiting inside
Thunder breaks down striking too loud
Nobody asks how’s your ride
Vapes on the table and TV controls
Flowers and meds there too
An iPad with messages of the missed calls
Suddenly flickers with blue
Evening emerges with pouring rain
Glistening streams patch the air
Darkening sky offers silence to gain
Cheaply, just out of nowhere.
if you want your conversations to be
more stable,
Never having to sleep in the stable,
Then conversations over the breakfast table,
Or the tea table,
Whenever you are able,,
Will give you a life that is more workable.
A day planned at the table,
Means no dishes in the sink,
or on the table,
No crumbs on the floor,
As you are heading out the door,,
Giving no reason for the slamming of the door.
Congenial conversations over coffee at your table,
Brings others to the table,
Who will always respect you and your home,
Whenever you are home,
To enjoy conversations at your table,
So, you can have a life that is more stable.
I enter the chamber, a shifting storm,
my footsteps echoing against marble and memory.
I do not knock. I arrive.
The air in the room thickens
I take my place at the ancient refectory table~
my hands folded, as if I hold the hinge of history.
I watch them~
the wary eyes, the clenched jaws,
the careful arrangement of words
meant to sound like certainty.
I lean forward.
I speak softly,
my whispers bending the room
more than their shouts.
When tempers ignite, I rise~
not in fury, but in full authority;
and the chamber falls silent,
as though the very walls recall
the ruin that discord once unleashed.
I press them,
not with threats,
but with the weight of consequences
they already know too well.
And when at last they yield,
not to each other,
but to the fragile truth between them,
I exhale~
a slow, deliberate release,
for I have steered the storm
toward a narrow passage of peace.
I am Political Negotiations.
I do not choose sides.
I choose outcomes.
I didn’t meet my monster in the dark.
I met it at the inner bargaining table,
where I sat across from myself
and tried to reason with a hunger
that wasn’t really hunger at all.
It knew every argument I’d make~
I’ll start over tomorrow,
just this once,
I deserve something small to take the edge off.
And I watched myself nod with complicity,
even when I knew the script by heart.
The table was crowded with ghosts:
loneliness pretending to be appetite,
fear dressed up as craving,
shame taking notes in the corner
as if preparing a case against me.
I kept thinking I needed more willpower,
but what I really needed
was to stop negotiating with pain
as if it were a reasonable guest.
One day, I finally looked across the table
and saw the monster wasn’t a creature
but a wounded version of me~
the part that never learned
how to ask for compassion and comfort
without claiming it in secret.
And that was the moment
the bargaining stopped.
Not because I won,
but because I finally understood
who I’d been arguing with
all those years.
The glasses are empty the wine has been drunk
A table left untidied, with plates undone
The young shoots are patterning the apple trunk
Life appears for the favour of young
The old branches cut and piled on the ground
The old shades now vanished away
The TV controls wait somewhere to be found
Time stands still as if on delay
I hear your voice, feel it shifts through the air
The breeze of this morning flies by
You say I can’t see you here, are you upstairs?
I probably am, I reply…
Label, Table, Abel
Love is the way you’re needed in the world.
Giving Peace to the wondering of your actions unfurled.
Patience was what you had while waiting for the missed.
Kindness was what you shown the stranger in your midst.
Goodness is the cause of the ending brought by you.
Faithfulness is the labor to see what's started through.
Gentleness to others that follow and are new.
Self control every label this list beholds is true.
what's the game?
have i mentioned this before?
a local Italian set-up somewhere in the capital
with sable decor and steaks
is this marketing at its grandest?
polytechnic stuff
the way he pronounces ravioli
is superb
passing him by the bathrooms,
he's gone all cockney with the kitchen chefs
what a performance
this is
my mate Gaz knows how symbolism works
his astrological memoir drops in july
he's going on tour and i call him to say,
"bring it down."
on the way out, i yell 'bravo'
Snickers candy bar wrappers
three gel pens
respirator
daily pills
notebooks
thesaurus
supplements
magnifying glass
pink erasers
snow boot
one mitten
eye mask
birthday card from May
things on my end table on September twenty-fourth
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
She measured flour in cupped hands,
never teaspoons or scales~
just the way her mother taught her,
back when the world was softer.
Her fingers, knotted with time,
stirred stories into batter,
each wrinkle a sentence,
each scar a footnote.
The table wobbled,
one leg shorter than the rest,
but she never fixed it.
It’s like us, she’d say,
a little uneven, but it holds.
Now, when I press my palm
into bread dough,
I feel her pulse beneath mine,
a ghost-knead,
a whisper of flour and sweat
and something like love.
The table sits empty now,
but sometimes,
if I listen,
it still creaks
under the weight of her laughter.
the related memoir vignetted can be found at poetrysoup.com/short_stories/memories_and_ghosts_13625
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