Fragile Days

 

 

 

Fragile Days
 

The thick coat I wear is  Irish tweed and

bears a poet’s pocket, a deep vessel

for the rescue of snippets: phrases, dreams,

memories,  ideas and inspirations,

The coat is soft charcoal grey and crossed with

blackened herring bones, quite long and belted,

woollen, warm and wide but no-one can tell

how very safe and snug I am inside

its tailored sanctuary or understand

my need for its constancy as I go

on my daily round.

 

Today, another swiftly passing day

of no merit,  I had eavesdropped; something 

overheard stilled me into silence. I

disliked its nuance, I  saved its essence, 

wrapped most of it up in sorrow and threw

the rest away.

 

I may seem calm but only I can feel,

as I walk, that my tread upon the stair

is aggressive, frustrated by cause of

my fear for the fragility of a

world which has lost all of its subtlety.

 

Beseiged now by its trappings I find myself

miscast till I am dizzy with fear that

I may topple.  But my poet’s  pocket

of words are close, they guide me away from

the edge of the abyss to a place of

recluse where I can write, safe once more in

my withdrawing room.

 

Cait O’Connor