The Singer

In the photograph on the back cover
of the singer's first album for seven years
he looks out through a rain-streaked window—
one half of his face,
blurred, smiles; the other,
troubled, is clear. He's turning away

slightly, as if to turn away
from himself. If you cover
one side of a photograph, then the other,
you sometimes see two people, years
of differences between them, the face
like hills at dawn from the window

of a plane. The singer leans on the window-
sill, awkward, staring. You look away,
recognising in the expression on his face
how imperfectly you can ever cover
the actual with the imagined self, despite years
of acting naturally: slips of the tongue, other

turns of phrase, add up to another
story. Through the shop window
an unfamiliar city lights up. For years
you stayed; how many went away
before you began to discover
you needed the same? And had to face

– 87 –

admitting that one side of your face
was deep in debt to the other,
that cantilevered promises could never cover
the distance from harbour window
to the view itself, a world away.
The singer's gaze surprises: the years

you loved his songs for their innocence were the years
you believed in your own; now his face
says: Everything can be taken away.
One bright eye resembles the shaded other
but neither is the window
of the soul; the glance is finally opaque, a cover-

ing. And the soul? Watch the face of another
watching you, for years; there's a chance you'll discover,
singly, or together (and it will be worth it) a way to open the window.