Shroedinger's Cat


The radio instructed me
I should hold a minutes silence
for something that
might have happened.
Something that could have been.
No certainty, more allegations
than bones, but still the country
was to fall silent, for something
that might have happened.
I asked my mate, Tom,
if I should adhere
to the madness of
remembering, something
that might have happened.
He wasn't sure, but is often confused,
he lives in a shelter,
for the homeless,
abandoned, and lost.
Once he lived with a bloke
named Shroedinger,
who at will, would keep him
locked up,
to check the infinite possibilities
of an uncertain multiverse and all
the things, that might have happened.
I reckoned Tom would know
if I should hold
a minutes silence, for all the things
that might have happened.
But he had no answer for me,
with his inscrutable
smile,
he was hopeful,
of better days,
tinned food, milk, warm fires,
and old ladies,
who spoil cats.


~ ~ ~ ~ ~


Silence


Once, silence
was a place we retreated
to.
From loud days, still ringing
in our ears.
Echoing words, of no
meaning. Wasted words.
Other peoples woes.
Breathe in
breathe out,
words are formed of sculpted breath,
and melt like swans of ice.
I used to welcome the
silent hours. Where coals
crackled.
Dishes. Rattled.
That’s all there was
the sound of your heart,
perhaps, and mine,
our breathing vaguely
intertwined.
Now we use silence
like a weapon.
You bludgeon questions
short with it.
And I fill mine
with resentment,
that I know you
can hear.
So loud and clear
that you and
I too,
would rather escape to that loud world,
which chatters on relentless
as a storm in the night.


• Tim Bedford says “I am studying BA in Creative Writing at the University of Cumbria. At thirty seven I might be a bit old to be at school. But what the hell.”