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Degrees of distance Who all died at different dates, known to each other: not just in the human race – united by five degrees of distance we’re told, but friends known face-to-face one day passing beyond contact, equal in regard One recalls, sitting in the garden under this autumn sun laughing, how John in voluminous overcoat pretended to inflate himself, on the Underground, arching his back slowly till he almost floated off, returning home on the last train And what was Martin doing one afternoon in bed, behind that frosted glass door with his ‘county’ girl while I played Bach, on a second-hand harmonium in the hall: I pedalled, he played, 48 years ago in a basement Life is the locus of a point that moves from person to person halting at grief or laughter A life is the locus of a point moving from place to place; some doors opening easily, some slammed shut Uneasy geometries nobody gets taught, we all learnt by heart, dreaming in October weather   Rain on the roof Now I’ve lit the stove, it’s begun to rain You can hear, impatient, its tapping on the roof – wanting to go about its business in a hurry Think how far it has come, from the sky, straight down, each drop, unthinking like a pebble that wants to go home, immediately: an army of precipitate precipitates falling down their cliff of air My stove, I think, will survive the stage of smoke to achieve a goodly red, a fierce orange roar before dozing off in a warmth it’s designed to share “Life, it seems, explains nothing about itself,” says James Schuyler’s Hymn to Life Life, I would say, had settled for persistence a billion years, or so before our lot turned up asking questions that could only ever have local answers What a destructive bunch we’ve proved to be, burning our way through explanations faster than forests – and just to keep warm Ah! sun has come out; sky clear Unhesitatingly, an aircraft’s con trail heads east-south-east A high wind moves the whole shebang steadily northwards, for no reason at all