5:44am

Jack Forbes

I’m up.

morning birds cackle
like witches of a dream.

I make a cup of tea in the half-dark.

a mound of dirty dishes
stacked beside the sink
like yesterday’s masterpiece.

light slowly fills the kitchen
and through the window,
a silent plane
tailgates the night.

down the street a car starts,
its headlights slowly blinking on
the way a sleepy cat will open her eyes.

deep blue hallways,
snoozing walls.

I sit in the study and think
of reading;
all the books on the shelf
with their stories and ideas
that the day can’t rob.

I spot my work shirt
hanging on the door handle
like a rag.

the ironboard groans, loudly, terribly
when I pull out his legs
and stand him up.

as if he doesn’t want to start work.

same, man.
same.

Jack Forbes is a teacher and writer, based in Melbourne, Australia. As an emerging poet, his work has appeared internationally, including Schoolcraft College’s MacGuffin, the Eunoia Review, AAWP’s Meniscus,  the Purposeful Mayonnaise, and The Suburban Review. He recently completed a debut chapbook of poems entitled 50 on Somerville Road.