Happiness

Monday. 8th February. Durham.

I found solitude where the hours expand

In the stale blood stains of coffee cups.

As when the pendulum

Swings past perpendicular

My increase was exponential.

Then the City

Opened its jaws

In a long, contented sigh,

And I walked in the valleys of its molars,

And I felt the warmth of its tongue.

And you know

That this cathedral

Is false hope.

Its tyrannical spires

Stretching everywhere higher.

On the way back down we passed the graveyard

And talked about death in eager voices.

You know rotting's such a bore—

I’ll stain the air with dust.

But what to choose?

A bench?

A tree?

A black smear in the sea?

'Twere now to be most happy.

‘I am happy’ is always a quotation.

The word arose

Before the cold stone

Of St. Mary’s College.

Before I was:

Giddy?

Emotional?

Not particularly sad?

But then:

Happ-eee.

So now that’s done.

But all happy families

Are not alike,

And you are not

That lost Venetian girl.

Today I wanted to ask

If you trust me.

I wonder if you know

I am of those

Too happy in their happiness

That monster their peace

With full-throated ease—

'Twere now to be most happy,

Like a train on a track,

Like a roofless room,

No turning back,

Or halting soon.

'Twere now to be most happy?

When you walk out in the morning with the sun beams on your back

And the dawn says you’re not breaking yet you still detect a crack.

And here's a performance of an earlier version of the poem (with a heavy cold!):