The Blind Man

Eyes of coral blossom
as grey as the silent moon,
dotted with tendrilled ether
that streaks his vision apart.

He blunders in hopeful
blindness at a fair old
lick, that inevitably leads
to collisions despite his cane.

He won’t listen
to anyone who kindly
suggests a change
of direction, or tempo in

his daily gallop through danger
laden streets, with paved curbs
pursed to trip or roughen up
his blind hubbed shoe.

He moves through his lighter
hours faster than any man with sight,
dazzled by shouts and horns, rumbling
engines, dense fuel smells, all conspiring

to act without reason or firm
association to anything earthly.
He runs between skyscrapers
of noise, hurtling like a fly,

crashing into silent windows, before
bouncing back into flight, too fast
to be embarrassed, or to breathe or
think. He lives in a world

as fast as sound, his nerves
jangling like an old piano, everything hits
his strings. Still everyone
suggests that he slows down

but he can’t
let the sounds get away
as they are his only map;
to give up running is to give into the dark.