Magpies screak as they stake out the rooftops.
Time passes, unbeloved. It’s Sunday afternoon
and we’re letting it slip by. The hours hang
from hooks like unused human implements
or drift at the threshold like fruit trees’ confetti.
A chair is a brute fact in the world. It asks
to be nothing more than what we find in it –
or place on it as we bring it into use:
metaphorical composure, a stillness,
a comfort, a vantage, a point of view …
Nor are the magpies clamouring for attention.
Nor is love arguing for a place outside time.
A chair sits undisturbed in the yard opposite,
its frame and seat flecked with white blossom.
