Today I wear a light grey merino top
It clashes with the rainbow scarf around my neck
But I wear it still as it is starting to match my hair
The people on my street don’t care much for matching
While the sun still shines the people browse along
Faces I meet they parade up street
Their past-times more familiar than names
Sitting beside the hearsay at the apple crate café
The brightly coloured relics of their hey-day
Brighten up the lives that brace against the passing grey
Away from the fray, yet near the river mouth
Just past forty three degrees south
Peering above my flat cup of white
The silage bales stew in the distant sun
Which competes with the wind for our small talk
Those endless competitors above watch us walk
People repeatedly robe and disrobe themselves
To much amusement of the elements
Refusing to be beaten in, they bask and burn
Under thin ozone and populate their skin
Little milk foam and chocolate smudged moustaches
Wander off on long leash with forget-me-nots and top knots
Blowing in the breeze, running, squatting, jumping
On mud-spot rainbow legs and boots like little bugs
Eating rocks and ripping leaves under the vacant gaze
Of tired eyes hiding under free-form hair
The wasps hover over mistaking my plate
For the garden from which it came
I make a side serving for them so they can sit
Humble company float before me incessantly
But much less obtrusively than
My own little bugs