January 22nd
Vigila tus pertenencias:
keep an eye on your belongings
while we keep an eye on you.
Swivelling eyeballs constantly keeping watch.
January 23rd
Tiny green buds
pop and bubble
prematurely,
speckling the bare limbs
with life.
Small clusters of people surge
and shuffle amongst the roots towards
the viewing platform,
looking out across towards
the man-made marvels.
Above them,
behind them,
ignored:
the buds blossom.
January 24th
La talla 38 es el velo occidental
(size 38 is the western veil)
Did Ingres check his model’s measurements?
or Rubens? or Goya?
Did Botticelli suck his teeth
when his model’s hips showed too much softness?
Did Leonardo crop his Mona Lisa
to hide her bingo wings?
The perfect 10.
A number more loaded than
Fibonacci’s sequence.
January 25th
If dawn’s fingers are rosy,
then what colour are dusk’s?
From this angle,
they look pretty rosy to me.
January 26th
There is an apple in a
frame in a window.
Not on a tree
or in a lunch box.
It is dangling from a string
surrounded by a frame
in a shop window.
An apple is no longer a juicy, fleshy fruit
that crunches satisfyingly and explodes with juice when you bite into it.
It is a symbol of technological advancement.
An apple is no longer a symbol
of temptation or original sin.
It is a sign that all we could want is a click or a keytap away.
January 27th
Streetlights blaze and glare,
blasting the quiet street
with light.
Reflected in the puddles,
reverberating off the walls,
transforming the world into greyscale,
their message as brutal as the alarm.
January 28th
Basking in the honey tones
of the setting sun,
a solitary dome
festooned with a cross
peers over the shopping centres.
Christ….or commercialism?
Nicola Heaney 