Smiling Distance

// Ran away skittle coloured and making gestures towards a dead bird
That sung as a sympathy orchestra of wind-instruments
Made of bones.
Jollied tambourines rattle sea-shells in polished wood as a disfigured signpost
of an event:
The feeling of looking for a car park midway through the annual Carols By
Candlelight concert.
All dead metal in a field emphasised with the ether
Stained by bleeding stage-light,
Not far enough from the sound to combat the juxtaposition
Of crowd and stillness.

Children, tired and running.

The blades of greenery printing as fossils in weight-given skin

– the living covert the living –

So in lifting a hand to light you imagine
Those indents lasting forever.
Elbows wet with the happiness of escaping champagne.
A Moon-Landing Kit’s complexity inside the dry weaved baskets.
Enough to make you sing a carol
A little louder than you would in the aisle of a supermarket
Between the cans and instant noodles. //