The world enters in flashes,
Like the sun through wickerwork,
As they sit at the table,
Arboured together.
A pump handle tips,
A mirror spills light,
A stooled mumble
Leans on the bar.
But they in their integument
Meander in the air
Build delicate patterns
Over the beer mats.
An ease of exchange -
Too long lost? - shapes
A geometry on which fall
All the tremors of the room.
Scrapings of chairs,
Smell of fusty leather,
Spume of conversation
At an adjacent table.
Fragments tremble
In memorial notation
Which frames of sound begin
To echo and to change in.
The world constructs them
When they build their shapes,
Patterns take on colour
From their words.
But whence derives that joy
Which he confides in her
As Plato casts his shadow
Over the beer-frothed table?
With ease they fashion shapes,
Map their forms to the world,
Without perhaps a wish
To force each other’s worlds.
They enrich the local scene,
Invoke no icons to assist
Their mutual and separate
Endeavour to exist.
©Terry Hodgson2020
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