michael dean

3 poems

SCOPE

Inside things are smaller

Things. Inside these, smaller ones

Still, this is the point being

To look at the smallest and then,

The think resting on the thing,

To say very clearly what is seen.

No easy task, as

Outside there are other

Things. Outside these, what is more,

It is very much the bigger picture,

To see them all,

The thinking being that it should be all of them.

Now, take the time and stop this.

That drop of petrol on the wet,

Spread so very thin and so very wide,

In every dint and over every crumb of tarmac,

Under the press of ignition and the roar

Before the flag

Or, in the warm soft nap of that gannet's throat.

Do not explain this.

DRIVEN, STOPPED

Mostly uprights they

Tone

Frame the moving parts

Blue, yellow

Tone, rain

Part of day

Caught and curved

Runs away

Part stays flat, flecked and grey

Tone tone.

CAR POEM

You are not in a car.

You are in a car.

It is day or night time.

My thinking on the matter,

My thinking on the,

On the,

- it does not matter.

You should not care. You

Have not started the engine.

If you do start the engine

Now I drive the car like this and this.

I am listening to music.

You are in the car.

We like this music.

Pull over.

There's my house, in the quiet street.

The porch light is on.