Taking my liberty

I’m sunning myself, against all advice,
metres from the river’s grassy bank.

I’ve learned a little, sitting here,
of Einstein’s life
and a thing or two about my own:
how much the universe resides within us;

how deep a smile or kind word takes root;

how the river, trees
and everything observed
exists vis our own disposition.

We have it in ourselves to shade the sun,
to dim the moon and stars,
to snuff them out and toxify the breeze.

Across the Ouse
trains clatter in and out,
the way they’ve always done.

The details change.
No whistling diesels idle in the MPD.
No hiss or sulphur stench of smoke and steam.

I open myself up
to endless possibilities permitted by the sun
and those few kind words.

A feather, soft and polychromic,
reflecting and absorbing light,
lies beneath my drying skin.

It gives me cause to think
of life, love
and of drunkenly acquired ink.