Timothy Murphy

An Old Man Speaks

You haven’t found me frothing on the floor
and bleeding from the tongue for a long time.
You are my weekly visitor. The door
creaks open, and a corpse dusted with lime
revives to smile. Danny, had I been straight,
I might be you, smothered in happiness,
children swarming my knees. But I’ve a fate,
Dom in the Anglo Saxon, and I’d guess
the All Father has placed me on this path
diverging in a leafless wood, to find
some way to charity, away from wrath.
My eyes are bandaged, so I’m choosing blind
between two destinations: Heaven, Hell.
Visit me here, and try to love me well.





The Dakota Institute Press has published Timothy Murphy’s three newest books: Mortal Stakes/Faint Thunder (a double volume) and Hunter's Log. Five more volumes will be published in 2013 and 2014. Click here.