Honey’s off, dear.

I wasn’t planning for a post this weekend, but then was reminded that a few days ago it would have been the birthday of my oldest friend, Ian, who, throughout our time at school, and for years afterwards, I called Jimmy. The last time I saw him was in June 2013, when I stayed for three days, with him and his wife Pat, in their home in Alicante. A couple of months later, he died. I wrote this for him then.

Nothing to be said
( James Ian Scott. d. August, 2013)

Invaded, occupied by multiplying
cells and the dark litanies of the names –
carcinomas, trophoblastic tumours,
melanomas – in the argot of the trade
they’ll be divided. Malignant or benign.

As if they might have consciences;
as though they had intention or design.

Brainless as weather, like hurricanes
or lightning strikes, or floods, or droughts,
they happen for…