Beginning

by FRASER SUTHERLAND (1946 -)

These are days when I would want to begin again
in some stranger-city, to drift into a bar
secretive and self-contained, my whole past
packed inside me like a bomb. An unknown
city, free of personal
associations. To begin again. To flower, each petal
full-looming in the light, until identified
as a common weed and then I
move on. To feel that lonely-aching hotel room
until I come to myself and strangely then
am grasped by others. To find new streets,
cafés, restaurants, and parks, a different soil,
to say, it’s me, I’m here as indifference breaks
like a grey day’s unexpected sun. You don’t know
about me I’m more than you think.

From: The Matuschka Case: Selected Poems 1970-2005., (reprinted with permission of the author)