honestly? the thing is, it’s not
even nice here. I love it here
but it’s not nice – it’s distinctive.
and I think if I’m honest
that I averaged happier
in london and happier in toronto
and much happier also
in new york up there
watching manhattan burn
orange from brooklyn
and curling from views
like a capital I with me
in it. but that said,
I do like it here sometimes,
and I like it quite often with you.
there is something about living
here in our liffey
apartment and leaving without you
to just walk around – the avenues teastained
with sunlight and everything
brown when it used to be white –
the city ringed in by canals
and full of horses like buckshot
in well-roasted gamebirds
and spat on a sideplate. I walk
sometimes into the city from here
and then out of it, into rathmines.
and the sky goes so ripe when you give it the sunlight
especially with all the pollution.
goes blue as a blueberry early on, and red
as a september peach.
DS Maolalai has been nominated nine times for Best of the Net and five times for the Pushcart Prize. His poetry has been released in two collections, “Love is Breaking Plates in the Garden” (Encircle Press, 2016) and “Sad Havoc Among the Birds” (Turas Press, 2019)