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13th September, 2024

Friday Poem – ‘R-O-M-J-X’ by Martyn Crucefix

Close up photo of an optician's testing equipment

This week’s Friday Poem is ‘R-O-M-J-X’ by Martyn Crucefix from his collection The Lovely Disciplines.

R-O-M-J-X
She asks is it better with or better without
her glass in his eyes like sweets in his mouth
the woman moving in a dim-lit room
barely visible yet she insists on breathing
through the long defence of his privacy
how he loves it when she blows air in his eye
happy when he’s asked to concentrate
on the balloon she conjures on a glass screen
its vivid reds above the white stripe of road
set him dreaming of imagined Americas
murmuring in pastel shades now she crowds
voices pleasure whether he’s right or wrong
wants him to spell out her strange words
though this morning she does not ask him
to number the white streak of falling stars
to his disappointment has no reason
to gentle his head into the rubber clamps
though he submits to the dazzling of her lamp
is it the red she asks is it the red or the green
O how he loves her vocabulary of absolutes