Drums

I sound them on the timber tabletop, fingerprints padding a pattern between the red-inked pages of my notepad—the fibrous flutter of paper against itself—and wet ring upon ring upon ring of condensation layering where the foot of my glass has danced between every sip. I slurp in another mouthful of beer, feel it—hear it—flush it back and forth under pressure over my teeth, as white water over rocks. It slushes in syncopation with the nervously pacing tap-tap-tap of an unpolished triptych. Ring, middle, index. Ring on the one and three beats; middle and index splitting the two; index returning on four. Repeat. In brief learning the three sticks drag, then accelerate, soar, explode: blurrier in each recurrence until they trip themselves, victims of a mind studying the rhythm too closely. The sequence quivers and collapses; the snare kicked over mid-set, the cymbal rolling across the stage, the band stumbling, waning, into a muted void. Yet the pause is ephemeral; the sticks restart, hesitatingly again for a few rounds of a new sequence, then confidently into a space of semi-detached focus sitting neatly and briefly undamaged, just out of conscious reach. Until the next shock of a synaptic spotlight brings a cymbal crash of destruction on the trembling tabletop. Tap-teh-tap-tap.

Tidal tones

Seaweed marks the beach: topographic wheelies of brown leather etched across damp grains by the drunken wanderings of waves. Gritty growls thump my eardrums erratically; the sound of sand. A scowling auditory texture that fuses into a pleasing pop and crackle with the rhythmic baritone static of the tide. Gouged vinyl finding the needle on repeat. I squint, clench an unknown muscle somewhere near my ears. The clawing hum increases, groans, heaves, and finally drowns tenacious inner niggles; a rare break from within from beyond. Thunderous applause to the silent walker: racing, bracing, the wind facing. No rush to be anywhere for once, the finish line only coming with a choice to trek back in from the coast. Back to other volumes. I turn to the sea. The wild winter water sedates, televised in more than just glorious technicolour. Rolling rows of blues, greens, yellows, charred murkiness. Infinite. Mesmerising silk torn in jagged, crashing shreds with each hollow, thudding contact absorbed on the shore. With them, my brain flicks back into some median of focus and I walk on. To linger a little longer on the sand, in the static; really wanting to ever-follow the weaving, unscripted trails cast unsteadily far past the farthest I can see.

Midnight

Ke-chuh-ke-chuh.
Tires on tracks,
a nocturnal rhythm that echoes
just ahead at the crossroad
long after the tram has called it a night.
Closer though,
bluestone
flags a perilous route home,
a bump or less, a careless step,
and
fibrous ligaments may fray
as cheap wool, two ply, under only gentle tension.
The result another type of
urban sprawl?
Ke-chuh-ke-chuh.
Only midnight? Really?
Hurry home, the tires order,
hit the steel lids
between the tracks,
as if to keep them firmly closed to shadowy shapes
that may otherwise rise from the pipes below.
A side street away,
no traffic to slow me.
Just keep on stumbling the obstacle-burdened path.
Ke-chuh-ke-chuh.
Auditory companion in the hush-hush.
Done with drinks, with dancing,
I want toast,
burnt, scratchy claws against
the numb grain of my tongue.
To strip the stink of the strip,
disappearing behind,
ke-chuh-ke-chuh,
with every rubber rotation
and swaying stride.
Boozy breath,
sweet late-night treats—
tomatoes and defrosted doners—
shouldn’t be so generously fragrant
in their sensory attack
after a dozen
rounds of ‘cheap’ three-fold-cha-ching sauv-blanc.
Several clicks
and glassy clinks
past sunset,
ke-chuh-ke-chuh,
no tram in sight but still
the depot calls one of us.
Ke-chuh-ke-chuh.
The rails ever-present,
markers on the darkened clock.

Haikuna shoetata

(served in threes, even for feet)

Oh pink grinding stone,
grit upon my wooden toes.
Wear me lovingly.

Timber feet, pointed
gifts in the foraging hands
of the curious.

Sand is hardly sand
when shaped into discs, but still,
candles look cool there.

(with heel-clicking thanks to Diane Fiedler)

Curbside viewing

Berlin,
a basement bar
spills its contents into the muggy 10 o’clock twilight.
The sign across the street
bathes my curbside comrades in neon.
Paired. Quarteted. Quadrilateralised.
We coagulate on the concrete either side.
Just a few remain within.
I stretch out solo,
legs elongated into the steaming thoroughfare,
retracting for a moment every other moment:
bending to make knees the farthest joint,
accommodating
an evaporating drip-drip-drip of oncoming traffic
that warns us off the humid tar with echoing horn honks,
and the occasional bicycle,
ripping past with the whirling whoosh of chain on cleat.
Return my legs just as swiftly
to extension,
to avoid much interrupting my rubber Converse toe tips tapping
a rhythmic beat
one against the other.
It’s the only steady and confident pulse I can find,
a scared, sweaty single
on the sidewalk.
I lean back 45 degrees,
palms pressing parallel into pavement.
My heart feels in equal measure along each flattened fingertip,
and out across the tessellated tiles
that disappear beneath the crowd.
The discreet boom-boom-boom
some sort of comforting bass in my noisy head.
I people watch;
want to join the chatter but at once satisfied
with silence and solitude.
What if someone talks to me?
German swirls, lugubriously licking at my ears.
Glad I don’t understand; I drift in easy detachment.
What’s German for ‘rhubarb rhubarb’?
I snicker to myself.
On the opposing cobbled coastline,
an inky blacktop’s width away, the sound of
glass shattering,
ice cubes scattering,
chiming against the unyielding asphalt.
Unapologetic, the singleted perpetrator weaves around
a parked car,
shoed weapon pointing the way
as he lithely slides back onto the
timbered target of his trestle bench.
No compensatory drink for the sorry sidewalk sitter,
though onlookers groan in disjointed, half-hearted
collectivity.
Moments later
I knock my own drink into the gutter,
and don’t dare look up for a minute,
lest it cement indignity on this date for one.
Avoidance complete, I look around again.
Felt-hatted, residing down the curb a bit,
cocks his hip, lean frame flicking his weight from left to right,
and giggles into the embrace of his circle.
Handsome blond across the street unashamedly
crunches ice cubes
from the near-empty glass of his brown-bearded boy
when he ducks inside
for refills.
Cute familiarity.
I play with my security blanket,
watch the battery level confidently head towards vulnerability,
and cautiously caress a replacement round.
No same mistake twice tonight.
I spot the lone other single figure,
sipping a beer and pacing nervously in
no-man’s land between the curbs.
I wonder if he’s solo like me,
till his friends show up,
and they stitch themselves into the growing patchwork
that casually drapes itself over the ageing night.