Driving at Night

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The sky is almost fully dark now,
tinged with greyey-blue.
But the banks and bridges and trees
are silhouettes yet-
skeletal branches grasp and groan against the sky,
clinging to the last of the light
as the flailing arms of the damned did in the River Styx.
Black, doomed and black.
Void of flesh and blood and bones,
they are just shadows,
foretold beneath our eyes.

The Librarian

She never wears her name badge,
but I like it that way.
If she did,
it would be like her achilles heel
pinned to her breast
unnatural.
She has this sort of nonchalance about her,
eyes rest unblinking
on some far-away spot,
hidden but to her.
That stare in any others' eye
would be moronic,
but she moves hands across the counter,
adept.
Folding, typing, swiping, handing.
Her callous lips split into a smile
revealing pointed teeth
as smooth and pale as eggshells...

I keep my vigil,
peeping from between Flaubert and Flemming
catching my breath when she laughs,
as though gargling gravel.
A second,
then the stare again,
that confounded stare!
Folding, typing, swiping handing.
I wonder what she reads,
an accolyte of Plath, I reckon.
She's pensive too, just like Esther Greenwood
and a little bit cruel.
I want to nurse her,
to stroke her mousy hair
and clasp those bony fingers to my cheek,
'till warmed.
O! I'd be her Atlas
and bear her world as well as mine-
to press those lips to mine,
a second.

I know one day she'll see me here,
perhaps she will condede.
But for now my vigil must be kept
so I loom and watch,
unseen.

Thunder

Thunder sounds above,
Huge great claps that swallow us up.
Lightning scalds each pore,
Yet we're happy here in the drumming rain,
Biting the wind with our teeth.
You pass one cautious hand through the shadow
on my hipbone,
Sweeping the air to one side,
So you can reach the watery skin.
We tremble together,
Choking on each others' gasps,
Rubbing noses.
Swallowed, scalded, damp and cold...
Three hours 'till morning
So we dip our heavy heads
and pray that the sun lets us go.