i can talk to the sun, did you know?

he tells me about his day

and each time i walk home, i take a pouch of his light

as a gift of my kindness



this careful young girl walked home 

a spring in my step

then my vision suddenly spots

a sad rain cloud looking at me



frightened and worried she looks

anxious and tactful i am

i pour her the warm sunshine

the contents of my pouch emptied



pipper and bright the cloud looks

she is happy and joyful

her rain has disappeared

she rushes off to join her fluffy friends



i decide to walk home

the spring gone from my step

this careful girl stares into a mirror of time

i will wait for tomorrow's routine

The news broke into his place
when he was less prepared.
It entered through the window

like a common thief
took that which was most precious:
all his future dreams,

far and dark
in the mystical place of the deep.
It hurts

as if you squeezed the ice-skating rink
frozen he goes,
undetectable to the eye.

Commuting next to you,
in 25 D, from Banbury to Birmingham,
for him, is not a breeze.

ice fire and the cryogene.
clear water with most love.
sprouting the finest being.
The god of love.earth.

Have you tasted the bitterness of tears of despair?
Have you watched the sun sink through such pale, balmless air
that your soul sought its shell like a crab on a beach,
then scuttled inside to be safe, out of reach?

Might I lift you tonight from earth’s wreckage and damage
on these waves gently rising to pay the moon homage?
Or better, perhaps, let me say that I, too,
have dreamed of infinity . . . windswept and blue.

This poem about sympathy for someone contemplating suicide was originally published by TC Broadsheet Verses. I was paid a whopping $10, my first cash payment. It was subsequently published by Piedmont Literary Review, Penny Dreadful, the Net Poetry and Art Competition, Songs of Innocence, Poetry Life & Times, Better Than Starbucks and The Chained Muse.

Is it weird that I can write
About some things I’ve never experienced?
People tell me I’m good with feelings

But I have only my empathy to thank.