RETIREMENT

The poet has cut his hair
and bought a flat in the city.

At night he talks to the sky
but doesn't write it down.

When he hears a pigeon call,
he doesn't compare it to anything,

even in his head. Each night
from the window all he sees

are buildings. He ignores
how the silver in the roof tiles

looks like stars, how the shadow
of a cat appears big as a tiger

with the moon behind it.
He's given his poems away,

left them on bus seats,
scattered the pages

of his unfinished collection
on the rails of the tube.

Sometimes he imagines
the footprints of the tube mice,

sooty on his words,
the swirl of pages,

showing off
in the backdraught of a train.

by Kim MOORE, in "IF WE COULD SPEAK LIKE WOLVES", Smith/Doorstop Books, 2014

Sea also: www.ipernity.com/blog/armando.taborda/768593

as well as

Kim Moore Poetry: kimmoorepoet.wordpress.com

(post 1st edition, 2014; 2nd edition, 2021)