Happy Birthday

Birthday Morning
a dawdling dawning of all that has transpired
the falls and fumbles
isn’t it strange
how we first remember the bad times
but a half-turn in the half-sleep interjects
and injects a happier spell
a second kiss
a first victory
a sickening excitement


Birthday dawning
slow morning with a tick as long as an eon
and a tock
echoing in a watched kettle
dull grey Irish day with the bentheads
on the way to toil
watched from the window sill by
the birthday suited boy
tick
tock
tick


Birthday morning
Teeth show yawning and fall back
onto the messy bed
head swimming with years of reminiscence
like some hack of a poet
attempting to rewrite an ordinary life
into windswept whimsies
another sleep
another dream
a second kiss