Un

Reed thin the Asian chick behind the counter always offers a smile.
Not required for the price of a coffee, she gives it guilelessly
an accented "Have a nice day" flutes through my bleary eyes,
maybe bringing a hint of humanity, or maybe its the coffee.

But my blood thrums finally instead of oozing like a syrup and I
can lift my head high enough to take in surroundings.

Never look closely at the foot path, it does not fair well beneath
the constant repression of feet, blood and semen has seeped into
the cracks between pavers, mingling with discarded paper and plastic
wrappings, till my feet glide over pulped disappointments.

Its early, obviously, and the traffic is belching a miasma of mixed
petrol and gas emissions, a grey cloud unlike the fogs I once feared,
how they would not part no matter how hard I begged.

Fog is Gods assassin, all creatures within its depths have many teeth
and they always sought my flesh. The taste is metallic, alien entities
striding just out of vision, probing cattle and thousands of humans for
endless years, although what did the Simpsons episode say?, you can only learn so much
from anal probing.

Horns blare, first one , then several as merry travelers join in the song, the subtle
refrain just beneath the surface " i hate you, your making me late" echoed with
"No, I hate you more, you are blaming me for not moving quickly enough but I found out
this morning Helen miscarried again, thats three in a row, and she is weeping while she sleeps,
the bank will not give me more time to catch up on the mortgage, and fuck knows when or
if Helen will be able to work again soon, Ricky needs braces and thats five grand I don't have,
to be honest, I have never had, and it all seems to crush the sides of my skull, just that constant push against the bone"

They move along finally, horns becoming more strident, car horns bleat violence in sound.

My face is a raft, adrift on my head, becalmed by time, it does not billow or fill with wind for now,
how is it between 35 and 55 we do not change? Our bodies, our faces, our skin, all enters a time warp, fixed in one design, we can walk 20 years with no improvement, or disintegration, just stasis.

If you asked, do I like the city? I would have to say no, I was always one for trees and dreams and river and rock, but truthfully, the city wants and needs the likes of me, to track its path, to note its history, to see the beauty in all its horror, to see evil and how it balances a smile with your coffee


Morning walks slower than the rest, its feet are heavier, leaden, trying to shrug away the pall of grey light and allow brighter things to come. Morning tastes different, it is toast and juice and muesli flakes, it is wet air and freshly washed hair, it is hurried conversations, sorting details in moments, planning days in seconds.

Morning offers another chance, sometimes.