End of day

Evening comes – no, midnight –

and the cogs are finally coloured to a shine,

placed inside the casing of my heart

as the rest of my body, weary

from the day’s high, erratic strings

winds down into standby mode.

 

Tick, whirr, beat.

Tick. Whirr. Beat.

Tick… whirr… beat…

Advertisement

Off Beat

‘Did someone pull you by the hand?’

you ask.

 

‘No,’ I answer. ‘My heart discovered

it was beating a different rhythm

to the one it thought it beat.

 

It was shocked, angry at itself

and guilty when it discovered that no matter how hard it tried,

it couldn’t find the melody it’d lost.

 

The new one was too strong,

too wild, too free and

too accepting of itself.’

 

‘And of the heart

whose rhythm it once matched?’

 

‘It beats still, sound and capable,

ready to find another

to fall into sync with.

 

Mild and honest, it will always

be true to its owner.’

Step to it

Beneath our feet in the coils of carpet

full of dander, paper fibres and pollen,

past the underlay thick as a pinky finger,

the floorboards warped to become musical notes

when stepped on, down

into the foundations

is a pulse. A beat.

A rhythmic tap of a dancer’s shoes,

the drum of fingers on a worktop,

a family getting into a car and shutting the doors

one after another.

When the house is empty,

the beat stops.

A light in the unoccupied spare bedroom switches on.

Click.