of leaving

Hourly, I still taste
myself in my own mouth:
occasional influxes, Ninety Miles of salt and sweat
and I've an invisible bruise on my forehead
from the thinking,
and on my neck...

breakfast cider culls the drinking
caffeinated asphyxiation
blinking through Monday morning
It's all through the throat,
that old communicative fault --
though still leaving the best for last
or next time
or never

and that lovely old ache
of class, of past and morning --
or mourning, as he put it -- that reproductive ache
of habit, haves and have nots
the giving of give and take

but when I wake, nothing's un-same
the day before rebirths itself
making a child of two humans
from parents of eight
(and old eight creeps back in, oh
she's my only friend, really)
and the sun is still here
and we're swimming
we're the sand
we're hands with hands in hands
we're sinking into the ancient
what-were
rocks

and even with sudden instigation, being
caught with deliberation
by the hand of the Shaman
caught me by surprise
for lessons in nines
never come easily, well

just this once.

But then home's habits call
huger than even these
and so I find myself

driving. I recall an old friend,
or, rather, his arrangements
to edge against shoulder lines, to defy the road's form
I furied at his schemes, yet:

hurtling down
the Mangamuku gorge
and then again, howling through Brynderwyn
I consider my own choices
of swerving, despite --

and almost because of
 feeling, finally, happy.