The sun is always there

you used to say

there behind the clouds

waiting to break through.

 

I hung on those words.

 

And now I wish you were here

so that I could show you

how outside the rain’s been falling

for longer than I remember

day after day after day

and the skies are grey and heavy

the streets run with water

the fine clothes we were so proud of

are now stained and patched with mould.

 

I wish you were here

because without you this town is empty

and I drink alone

hunting the echo of your laughter

finding only the bottom of the glass

again, over and over

till closing.

I want to whisper drunken secrets

in your ear, as always,

to tell you that I miss you

and that I know now you were wrong.

 

The sun won’t be coming out anytime soon

and your words don’t change that

the world is full of people lashing out

with cruel knives and sharpened words

eager to draw up battle lines

to fall back into the certainty of trenches

the comfort of old wars

wrapping themselves in tattered flags

and the blood of strangers.                        

 

I want to tell you

that today, as the rain falls

and the light fades thin,

marionettes are dancing

to sweet discordant music

blinded by silver, bought off by gold                            

that we have learned nothing

that I put a foot through the TV long ago

and it made no difference.

 

I’m burying hope

just as I buried you

in bitterness and baffled consternation

shuffling forward to nothing very clear

more from habit than in expectation

and somewhere in the corner of my eye

I see the ghost of your conviction

and your smile 

telling me 

the sun is always there

behind the clouds

 

damn you

 

the sun is always there.