White Noise
Bryan Ferry
2025
It's too hot to run
Better to lie in wait
Cool water from the machine
and at the press of a button
tapes from home
In a week I submit fifty articles
and where are they now?
Adrift
That's all my nights fractured
with a foreign pulse
The kick of adrenaline
Limitless breath mints

To all my students I say the same
Nothing is planned but things happen
Stories write themselves
and if it doesn't fit
It never will

The fan's plugged in
I'm tired
in a collar again
With the click push of a pencil
I've erased seasonal breaks
Winter is slimmer
There's the unaddressed lust
for a long weekend that I'll pause over
Sleep
Says the dog
Gnawing at the back pages of today's paper
Set her on a room of experts in their field
and she will find the duds

The river's low
and it's so early the billboards are still lit
Bins are piled high with bags from other bins
There's a bleed
I turn in the bed
We're going to have to start
tightening the taps
Tying up the live wires
and cutting the white noise out