Times For and To
By Jim Murdoch
After he died I cried all day,
and most of the following
then some the day after
and then barely a blub or a groan.
I should’ve paced myself only grief is so moreish.
People think it eats you up but they’ve got it all wrong.
The next day still wasn’t an everyday day—
too much to expect, far too much—
and it wasn’t even a day without sorrow
but it did somehow contrive to be,
and not for the last time
(well, we’ll see about that),
the first day of the rest of my life.
Jim Murdoch is a prolific Scottish poet who published 140 poems in 2025 alone and wrote another 200. More often than not, his work winds up in webzines that fold after two or three issues but occasionally, he’s managed to catch the eye of an editor in more established journals like Acumen and Stand. He currently lives quietly in Glasgow with his wife and, whenever the mood takes him, next door’s cat. You can find him here on Facebook.