Two birds

Two birds broke free, sudden
Into the blue
From behind continental clouds.
Tiny, tiny, away from 
Clockface clutches
And human musts

They lift my lungs

I've been failing to fill,
As my muscles sink sighing

Into the ground -
I can watch them fly

I can watch them fly
And nothing else.

LJ Ireton 2023

The Stranger

I don't know your name,
But you came to me -
Out of all the walking galaxies
We are,
Dust and stars -
And asked me the question.
 
I saw the swirling dirt
Somewhere in your spirit,
And I knew it -
We never forget
Our sandstorms in the dark.
But I could feel you distrusting
Someone with light 
Like fireflies visible through their skin -
Just like I did, too.

Believe me, when I said to you:
'Just hold on',
It was from my own interstellar years -
Adrift and waiting.
My witness is made and made of dirt - 
I speak with the echoing birth
Of a star. 

LJ Ireton 2023

For a walk

He says: 

'we can go for a walk in the forest at three thirty'.

I say:

'we will go for a walk when the forest creatures call me'. 

LJ Ireton 2023

This morning I saw seagulls

This morning I saw seagulls,
Far from the sea
Circling the moon

I can not tell the type of day I'm walking in to - 
The Sun, on the other side, said it loved me
But I have a stone in my shoe
On the way to the station

Change can be mysterious, it can be
Frustration.

I am far from the sea
Circling the night -
The only certain answer
To a day of
Question. 

LJ Ireton 2023

The other world

I can't describe the mystery of healing -

I only know the feeling
Of crying into my cat's fur -
Like my own solitary cloud.

And hearing her rolling purr -
Like all life is silent 
Apart from her way of breathing.

That a form of prayer
Is listening to the rhythms of the other world -

The angels with claws.

LJ Ireton 2023