Fumbling with the Mathematics

The night terrors take over
Sweatyshakes and screams waking neighbours
And starting a chorus of foxes;
Crying like panic into the night.
The very odds against meeting you
Are simply astronomical
At best.

Seven billion people
Halved by sex
Divided by geography
And still I never fancied my chances.
And then the formula,
(Beyond Einstein, beyond Hawkins)
To figure out the particulars…
The Where’s and the How’s and the When’s.

Even this does not compare to the complication
Of the common denominators of our compatibility
Sub-divided by how beautiful you are
Times how ordinary I feel next to you.

I have held meetings with quantum physicists,
The greatest minds across our history,
And I have asked them
The simplest question:
Will one plus one ever equal two?
They shrug their shoulders, unknowing,
Just like the rest of us.

But then I wake
And you are watching me
And the love in your eyes is bigger than the cosmos
It is as unfathomable as life’s biggest mystery.
You are more beautiful than God, I think.

And you kiss me on the lips, like heaven descending,
“lucky bastard”, you say.

LOVE SOMETIMES LURKS BETWEEN THEM

They are captives to cynicism,
Slaves to the bitterness of experience.

Longing for the innocence that was once theirs
And loathing the innocence of others;
Happiness they now call naivety,
Love, a misunderstanding.

Removing their clothes like tired old excuses
They slip into a freshly made bed
And surrender themselves to the inevitable
With a sigh

Only to find the bedsheets are made from linen
And love sometimes lurks between them.

A MERMAIDS TRICK

She used on me
A mermaids trick
Singing lullabies and ballads
And haunting laments
Carried over seas
By the winds and waves
The beauty of which
Took me to sail
And I
Like many sailors before me
Have found myself now
Dashed against her rocks
Shipwrecked upon her shores

Untitled III

It was unremarkable
Our first meeting
Except for the birds singing
The sun setting
The heart bursting
The Earth turning
Anticlockwise

It was unremarkable
Our first greeting
Other than the time stopping
Ears popping
Stomach knotting
Throat garrotting
Sweaty palms

It was unremarkable
Our first meeting
Except for you

Big Bang (innuendo not included)

Awake now eternal

I consider the conception of the universe,

And how,

From the nothingness,

Life could grow;

Expanding still.

It is the same for me.

A void; an infinite emptiness; explosion; (you).

And then;

Heart started beating,

Love did grow;

Expanding still.

Christmas Tree Poems (for Naomi)

I

In the winter air,

Our breath,

Mini clouds,

Form shapes

And hang there

Like silver decorations.

It mingles

With steam

Rising quickly

From woollen hands

Holding spiced wine

And cinnamon sticks,

And dissipates

Amongst the mistletoe.

Your cheeks

Are like

Toffee apples,

Hair like ribbons.

Your lips are gifts

I want to unwrap.

And I wish it could be Christmas everyday

Love is my Religion (From Keats To Fanny Brawne, 13 October 1819)

I

You have ravish'd me away
By a Power I cannot resist,
I become humbled,
The nearer to your grace I exist.
If Love is my Religion
Then you have become my Christ
And, until the ever turning
Hands of time desist,
I worship your body, mind and soul
Your ever-faithful priest.

II

Born again,
I am an ex-smoker
Exhaling virtue.
Your love has become my religion
And there are posters of hyperbole
Stuck up outside my church.

I can now often be found in shopping centres
With a microphone and your photograph
Shouting into the wind.

I knock on doors and tell strangers
All about you
Offerings of tea becoming more and more rare.

Each poem I write now
Is a sermon
To you.

III

Reasoning against the reasons of my love
For you
I may as well be arm-wrestling God
For all the good it will do us


IV

My Love is selfish and it is cruel. It will not let me sleep until my eyes have the outline of your body, which is curled up next to me like a spider in a bathtub, burned indelibly, so that when I close them, my lids become cinema screens, playing your movie on a loop until the sun bleaches the morning
And you stir, and reach for me.

My love is selfish.
And will not let me be
My love is selfish.
(Just
as love
should be)