eye-drop moments (26/Sept/18)

it feels as though the only time I find a moment of peace is when I’m putting in my eye-drops… a single task, pure focus, if in a slightly contradictory sense… I always sit to do it, rest my head on cushions and first one then the other, drop, drop, blink, blink, close, hold… still… stretching a moment into a minute… hold… still… nothing moves not even me… the initial welcome coolness imperceptibly warms matching my body temperature… blink, blink, open, blink, blink, open… wipe away drop-tears glistening on the underside of my lower lid… then it’s over and the world stridently strides back in on specks of dust and skin bringing with it all the discord and dissonance glaring and threatening, staring into my bright shiny new eyes looking out… I don’t know who I’m trying to save anymore, or why, having been in what feels like a holding pattern for more than ten years and maybe even more… when was the last time I felt a sense of place or even a sense of time, when was the last time I felt safe?…… people spend years chasing contentment never to find it, I’ve given up on that, of all the goals to have for a goal it’s the one paved with near-misses and close-shaves… I have the scratched graffiti on me to prove it… is it better to want and want or simply surrender and with any luck at some point be surprised?… good old expectation again, a human curse, I wonder if other animals suffer this sufferance…… this lot is up for auction, place your bids early as it’s a one-time deal and when it’s done it’s well and truly done, over and out, so get it while stocks, of one, last… the blur has settled now, two happy irises, ready as they’ll ever be to spend the day being filled with yet more crap until I once again have an eye-drop moment…

© 2018 robert greig

punching above my wait (21/Sept/18)

waiting, waiting, I do a lot of waiting, waiting, we all do, even when you think you’re not you are, you’re joining the ranks of waiters, though not necessarily serving over-priced nouvelle cuisine to over-privileged customers… perhaps I should distinguish by inventing a new words, waitrels, as in ‘wastrel’ without the ‘s’, after all your wait could be nothing more than wasted time… in the back of one’s mind or the forefront of your thoughts always waiting, waiting… waiting is tiring, sometimes downright exhausting, definitely occasionally exasperating… waiting, waiting…for someone or something or some time in space to relieve you, let you go, let you breathe, release you from your cage but it invariably may be through to the next inevitable and inescapable wait… you’re waiting for this blog to end, I’m sure of it, waiting, waiting and wondering how and when, for the punchline, the upshot, the revelation, the twist in the tale, the point of it…… I’ll be kind and release you early by revealing now that there isn’t one and more than likely fizzle out into nothing more impressive than a damp squib, soggy, limp, unseemly… what I can’t promise you though or help with is that there won’t be another wait, not necessarily of my doing, waiting at the end or at least on the way, imminent, itself waiting, waiting to waitnap you into its waiting, waiting maw… so who will get there first I wonder… you or the wait?

© 2018 robert greig

shape (15/Sept/18)

the shape of sight is what you see before your eyes… the shape of sound is what you hear all around… the shape of smell is what can fit inside your nose… the shape of touch is what you’re touching right now… the shape of air is everywhere… the shape of water is what trickles through your fingers… the shape of fire is what hides inside a flicker… the shape of earth is what’s standing in a footprint… the shape of night is found inside a shadow… the shape of day is what is in a second glance… the shape of dark is what’s been missed and overlooked…. the shape of light is what’s often mistook for a trick of the eye… the shape of a thought is not unlike a cloud and the shape of a cloud is not unlike a beautiful lie…

© 2018 robert greig