begin
at the middle
go back
to the end

then circle round
to finish
at the beginning

once you figure
it out
let me know

I’ll be waiting

(D James)

seems like it
used to crawl

now I lose
track
of the days

and memories
are like stories
someone once told

I’m not even
certain
I’ve not written

this poem
before

(D James)

pulling cars across
metal track

to the top
of the mountain

the skyline
like a picture
postcard
at sunset

a symphony
at full tilt

a mass of steel
and glass
thousands
of lighted squares
and twinkling
red lights

reminds you
that this city
in its ebb and flow
was here before you arrived

and will remain long
after you are gone

(D James)

bare trees
drag shadows
across gray
roof-tops

sunlight glints
off passing cars

the day goes on
with or without us

(D James)

never and always
right and wrong

bone and dust
blood and guts

intransigent and flexible
solid and liquid

everything
and
nothing

(D James)

when what lingers
is the dying vibration
of a sound

before the next key
is struck

when the world
makes sense

and life is found
in the silence

(D. James)

and and and
bringing together
disparate thoughts

and and and
an endless string
of ideas

and and and
where I’ve been

and and and
where I’m going

(D. James)

wondering
where it went wrong
where I went wrong

feeling out of place
out of time
out of my mind

like a character
in an unfinished
Beckett play

waiting for something
like life
to begin
unable to go on
with no choice
but to go on

immobile
immovable
immature

with all the courage
of a well-fed
old house cat

wanting to know
how it all ends
when I should be thinking
where to begin 

(D James)

all those thoughts
of what I should
be doing
what I did
wrong

asking why

the grace and ease
so longed for
seeming far off
impossible

hoping
for change
and then
don’t want
the kind that arrives

realizing
finally
it is not an answer
I seek
but a way to live

to think thoughts
and take action
generate some
confidence

take some
responsibility
for my life

because if I don’t
who the hell will

(D. James)

the shoulds
the can’ts
the don’t want tos
the don’t have time
or money for

how much energy
is spent
on thoughts and worries
of that
which exists only
in our minds

how far
from reality
can we go
and still be considered 
rational

doesn’t it depend
on whose reality
we measure from

if life
is primarily
the stories we tell
then what kind
do you want
to make up

(D. James)