The Room                                                                     


            It gave a certain comfort
            The unpretentious leather sofa, 
            Seating two, small and dark
            Against the wall

            Across from it enough of sky
            To constitute a view,
            Portraits hung just so, 
            Several artefacts suggesting simpler times, 
            The doorway (more complex)

            And scattered everywhere
            The scraps: they festooned the room
            In disarray

            He checked the urge to gather them
            The way a banker bundled notes
            To fit the palm, and then the crisp rap
            Of the assembled edges on the desk before ...

            It was better this way, 
            The words exposed, 
            The window opened wide


            ________________________________________________________________________


            Emanuel E. García, 2014

          published in Take Back Our Sky, ed. Nola Borrell, New Zealand Poetry                   Society, 2014