Thwarted

Observing me from across the room,

she moves purposefully in my direction.

But an admonitory rustle of the page

stops her in her tracks.

Now she has turned aside.

Her belly sagging,

she gazes out of the window

where street lamps are reflected in her eyes.

MY LONDON

In my travel-stricken mind, the image of a street,

rain-shiny, or glowing in sunlight,

and those red buildings

(deep flush of Victorian London),

that tall flaking house,

the rotted timbers inside,

the old cat, the white one with a little girl's face,

now buried paper-thin in the garden,

the cherry tree, a poor thing but mine,

with a tumorous bulge around its ankle,

now chopped down and some memorial sections

propped on the steps to the cellar,

and why do I seem to see a solitary bicycle,

hurtling (yet somehow anchored by my mind)

down this street's shallow descent,

and not a car in sight...