Poem: Power Cut

saturday night (27/5/06)

journal entries
in the fading light--
birds lay on the music.


workers out of whitman
scrape concrete
round a three-foot hole.
they spin the job out
with slow talk and laughter,
while three pies melt
in my cooling oven.


the neighbour in the street
gone out to complain
now giggling in relief
that her backbone failed her.


and they're not working
while her ardour cools
in facile small-talk
over set-down tools!


shut up! shut up!
we want our power back!


without the internet
without tv
i write much more
than i would normally.


i think about the movie
that i saw today--
"walk the line",
the life of johnny cash.
june's face glows
in my mind's lit eye--
her hurricane love
for poor damned john.
i want someone
to look at me with love
someday, before i die.
but if they did, would
i not soon despise them?


gone down so deep
into the culvert
of my own thoughts
all outside sound
turns off.


it's getting dark.
writing in this
fading light
is giving me a headache.


go fetch the candles.
listen for a sign
those f****** will be finished
soon. it's nearly nine!


and when i wrote that the power came on like the poet had made some kind of witch's curse.