Down All The Days

DOWN ALL THE DAYS

Down all the days

I’ve stopped

And searched for you.

Down all the days

I’ve stood

And waited for you.

 

I

                Down all the days,

                                sometimes pausing in the cool oasis doorway

                                of an air-conditioned shop,

                                amid the cauldron roar of blasting cars’

                                satanic squeals of tyres

                                on the tortured tarmac streets,

                I’ve stopped

                                on sultry summer days,

                                when sticky people masses surge

                                in streams of sweaty bodies

                                on patient chess-board sidewalks

                                burning feet through tired leather soles,

                and searched for you…..

               

II

 

Down all the days

                some spent in wintered wind-swept parks

                deflowered by the savage thrust

                of sudden, icy air,

               unclothing trees and freezing brown the grass

                that playful Spring had dressed in vibrant, virgin green,

I’ve stood

                stolid as that empty park-bench there,

                catching wind blown papers

                with its rough cement supports,

                deserted by the hordes of summer sitters

                fled now to cheery warming hearths

and waited for you….

 

© Michael D Rosenthal

Durban

8 February 1973

Reviews

[Red Brick Keshner]

Through and through, down and through all those days, stopping and standing, searching and waiting. Expansive and comprehensive expression.