Suddenly, in Houston, Texas,
\nwhich is a three-hour-flight from home, I was buying
\na new bicycle from a salesman in a pale pink tie.
\nI\u2019d not been up on a bike
\nfor twenty-something years,<\/p>\n
and I had no plans of doing anything to change that
\nbut then there I was handing over my credit card
\nand looking down proudly
\nand taking in the bike\u2019s gleaming newness.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s where I was \u2013 Houston \u2013 when my wife called
\nfrom wherever she was in the world.
\nShe broke the news
\nthat she couldn\u2019t handle the deceit anymore,
\nfollowed by the news that she was having an affair
\nand, finally, the news that she was sorry
\nshe\u2019d not had the courage to have this conversation sooner.<\/p>\n
It was then the bicycle store began winking at me
\nfrom across the street, the way shoe shops have winked
\nat her down through the years.
\nMaybe it was youth winking at me,
\nor innocence, or adventure, or youth
\nand innocence and adventure all together
\nwinking at me then in the form of the shop.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s when I said we\u2019d talk more
\nwhen we were both home. Calm as could be,
\nno ire in the voice that said the words,
\na voice I didn\u2019t recognise, a voice I\u2019d taken
\nfrom the clammy breeze in Houston that day,
\njust for the speaking of them, and then returned.<\/p>\n
I was miffed slightly. That was the whole extent of it.
\nThat is the resilience of children, of course.
\nIt\u2019s when we get complicated we lose that
\nbut I had it again, all of a sudden, inexplicably.<\/p>\n
I was going to take my new bicycle out
\nonto some unmapped road
\nthat winds through a dry and dusty landscape
\nbeneath a friendly sun in a sky of blue and silence;<\/p>\n
a road that would be heading away from her;
\nwould end someplace good or, better still, not end.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
This was going to be somewhat a pastoral poem,
\nbut not anymore. The venue of it has changed
\nto here, this caf\u00e9, two tables in particular,
\nand the space between them.
\nYou can forget now about the lines
\nthat would have been, about summer
\nand cows and patience and grassy smells,
\nwith a measured reference to mortality, maybe,
\nat the end, tying it all somehow together
\nlike a bow on a birthday gift.
\nThe man at the next table has seen to it
\nthat those lines won\u2019t get written,
\nwith all his looking over and his concern
\nwith what I might be jotting down
\nbetween sips of my mocha. He has insisted,
\nmore or less, that this poem be about him
\nand his sandwich and his pot of tea,
\nand how could I not make reference
\nto his bag of groceries leaning against
\none of the legs of his chair?
\nThere is a bunch of groceries leaning there,
\nassembled together in a brown reusable bag,
\none that isn\u2019t any bit see-through.
\nWhat items the man keeps at the bottom
\nwill remain vast question marks
\nto the poem for what remains of eternity.
\nA carton of milk, though, peeps out
\nover the top of the bag. It is the closest
\nthese lines will have to actual mooing.
\nHe has given me a somewhat pastoral note
\non which to finish. I thank him for it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A New Bicycle Suddenly, in Houston, Texas, which is a three-hour-flight from home, I was buying a new bicycle from a salesman in a pale pink tie. I\u2019d not been up on a bike for twenty-something years, and I had no plans of doing anything to change that but then there I was handing over […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":151,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":[]},"categories":[333,334],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"yoast_head":"\n