poem: A Curse
(for two lovers in a café)

You smile at each other,
as lovers do,
so suffocating-sweet

I half expect
the milk to curdle
in the cup.

Do not get me wrong,
for you I will wish
a life together,

the days of it measured out
in front of you.
So much so, I would

have them happen all at once:
your life played out
in front of this audience

you have made of us.
(We sit politely,
feign indifference,

though all of us
know otherwise).
Let us have the highlights

and the lows, now,
as the days
reel out in fast forward.

Even as you pause to sip
your drinks together,
in sly complicity,

I can see the end coming
towards me — as you raise
your arms to drink,

your faces freeze
into a rictus as the skin
goes slack, then mocking grey.

We leave. File out quietly,
one be one,
to leave you there:

your cups raised,
your gazes forever locked
in stone memorial

to your pledge of love,
the looks, the words that say,
stay with me, now, forever.

lexicon: from Agyiomania
to Ultramontane

Agyiomania: 1. An abnormal interest in streets. 2.An excessive desire to be on the streets; especially, busy ones.
Exoteric: ordinary or simple (the opposite of esoteric).
Plenilude: the time of the full moon.
Ultramontane: relating to that which is situated beyond the mountains

These come from a list of definitions found amongst some papers. Judging from the material they were found amongst the list is at least ten years old. An old habit, listing new words (reading a dictionary is an even older one). Looking back it seems like there is an element of autobiography, in their selection at least. I do not suppose definitions drawn from a dictionary can really be called autobiographical, except, perhaps, of the people drawing them up.

lexicon: Decumbency

Decumbency: Staying in bed.
found in Leigh Hunt. 'Getting up on Cold Mornings'. The Indicator, 1821 reprinted in George G.Loane. Selected English Essays. J.M Dent, London, 1921