Tag Archives: Alienation

ask nothing

infinity
a crumb, our collective mind
from the day we are born
we’re enmired in longing
& we reach all our lives as if
our slow death has barely begun

infinity
we’re avoiding in the rain again
as it washes away the tears
past stars inert down the lane
dare we to wear our insides out
like we were ever here

who are we to hope for love
as we lift our heads above
the skies could fall any moment
how on earth are we alive

infinity
too many arks on mountains
for any of them to be the one
our jesus is nothing
our buddhas are nothing
so too our drowned expectations

infinity
it’s another god for the blind
yet we feel that white room calling
boundless, all walls fallen away
we’re dispossessed in night’s array
how heavenly the stars

who are we to hope for love
as we lift our heads above
each moment an accusation
how are we still alive

what if infinity left us blind
to vanish beneath the sands of time
& yet we hope
yet we love
we live

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2025

chair theory

i make space for you
& yet you make none for me
an eyeroll, a sigh
silence meant to break the heart
music has gone, now depart

depart, unwanted
before they take the last chair
break your monkey face

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2026

do the right thing

now i see that i
add not a jot of value
shall i lay me down
let them press on with their days
fruitful afore & after

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024

the distance

the eyes that skew away again
from what i have known all along
betray i’ll never be one of them
a stranger to their bonny world

their monuments hold to gravitas
even when living memory fades
as i maunder these streets alone
dust sieves through my pantomime veins

a thousand years ago today
the only space i’ve left for feeling
when i realise that no one’s waiting
that their light is all yet not in all
then i’ve never felt so far away

well, it’s not always been suffering
they tap me whenever i’m of use
yet their smiles mask the expiry date
a time to back off, to know my place

& i see that their sun too has left
will not anchor me to my shadow
that their moon with its pinprick halo
will not grant even slenderest grace

a thousand years ago today
the only space allowed for feeling
when i realise nobody’s coming
that their light is all yet not for all
then i’ve never been so far away

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2025

numen mentis

there’s whale song lilting in my brain
e’er beyond a distant shore
away from the fever dreams i
had circumnavigated
to be with you

in stoic avoidance i’d
edged between foam and dune
got shipwrecked in lieu of belonging
and realised this place was ne’er home
nor bullion of promises meant for me

was it e’er only me
this resolve i had to follow you

had it e’er been the face of god
that mine hands held out to enfold

there’s waters swelling o’er that shore
nigh on the embankment of my brain
and the whale song serenade
decrying happy e’er once upons
i finally see that i was satan all along

and ‘tween these flashes of meaning i
espy twin trails o’er bleary sands
one forged with longing, the other you
anchored away from expectation
the fading proof of our story

had i e’er only been
this resolve straining for you

was it e’er truly the face of god
or mine hands beheld to the prints of darkness

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2021