THESE BIRDS

The birds flutter between brick and tress

I’m all palms for their disinterest –

I know the birds, I don’t know the Name

I bend the brick dangerously in influence

But they’re there and I’m here, so nearby

The dappled beams they register not

I’m so close to blindness and enough

Of wanting to seek, reach, handle

Their security, they all call

But not for me

But I never stand

To address

Their borders stronger than mine

POEMS AND PARANOIA

You tease me about poems and paranoia,

unaware that we are always on guard

with our favourite toys, prepared

to reach the thatched ladder

over the black hole.

The one we are certain

we did not dig.

When you can be fat and happy

hunched over machinery sans guilt,

then you are one rich man falling.

Gift-giving makes such a man nervous

and she has included you childlike

in her great big-hearted basket.

The polishing of pride,

and the lending of contentment

are all swallowed by her good intentions

saved for unity and motherhood.

She kick-starts the leather and merry-go-round

without knowing what she has spun.