i.
I was
saying to you
About
the darkness
Of
this January morning
The
year’s refusal
Becoming
light
These
threads we weave
As if
we might assemble
A
moment
Gather
stories
Say
time
I was
saying as if
We
might practice
A
painter’s patience
Press against
the canvas
With a
palette knife
Colour
becoming shape
As if
perhaps
A
couple of people
Gestures
almost
Might
get the syntax right
As if
as we say
As we
watch the buildings opposite
All
those people after people
Who return
home
January
gradually
Comes
into focus
Words
spoken
No
tone.
ii.
I wake
to tell you
This
is a January morning
Waiting
for you to say so
In
your own voice
You
mention
I want
to say the light
But
for you
You
hear a bell chime
Weighted
against the city
You
say to me not
Unanswered
As a
pattern
You
want to say a riff
As if
we might place time
Assemble
some kind of rhythm
As we
walk the streets
Holding
as we go
These
fragments of a conversation
This
lifetime’s talking
These
days lived
This
dream
I told
you I keep having
That
we are speaking in the present
And it
is the moment
In the
sequence of variations
The
theme comes back
Holding
after the note
And
you and I are both listening
And
the tempo arrests us
And
time
Gives.
iii.
February
and I want to say
The
buildings have their winter yellow
As the
dumpsters are collected
By the
dumpster truck
Yellow
becoming grey
As the
palette is gradually perfected
This
temporality as snowdrops
And
then perhaps narcissi
Emerge
And
promise
I want
to say the earth
Or at
least perhaps the earth’s
Sequence
This
tense we occupy
In the
middle of our belongings
As
grey turns mauve
As
February shows its hand
Surprisingly
non-judgemental
Our
actions in part behind us
Only
this disposition
To prove
As if
it might be said
We
step into a February morning
And
the light across the botanic gardens
Holds
good
Nobody
forced out
As if
we had the capacity to say so
Galanthus
in evidence
Evidence
Love
David Herd [photo credit: Sarah Hickson] is the author of numerous books of poetry and prose. His most recent collection, Walk Song (2022), was a Book of the Year in the Australian Book Review and his forthcoming collection, As If It Was Possible This Morning, will be published by Shearsman later this year. He has given readings in Europe, North America, India and Australia, and has held fellowships at George Mason University, Simon Fraser University and the Writing Center, Gloucester, Massachusetts. His critical history, Writing Against Expulsion in the Post-war World: Making Space for the Human was shortlisted for the 2024 MSA Book Prize. He is Professor of Literature and Human Rights at the University of St Andrews and co-organiser of the project Refugee Tales.
the Tuesday poem is curated by rob mclennan
