Many of you reading this will already be anticipating what this will be about, some of you will just know that about a month ago ‘something bad’ happened. I thought about staying quiet and just getting on with things, I even thought about how writing this might affect the person primarily concerned. But this happened to me, not to them – this is my experience and in not publishing this I essentially feel I would be allowing myself to be silenced. Silenced by my own sentimentality perhaps, but silenced nonetheless.
People move in and out of our lives all the time, but I’ve always been a believer that there are special people, individuals who are so important that they shift our reality just a little bit. These people often arrive at exactly the right time. And sometimes they leave at what seems like completely the wrong time. They leave us with sharp fragments of mirror broken all over the floor, pieces that we have to put back together again in order to see a new reflection of ourselves – who am I now?
At their core these poems are about exactly this; about the things that are left behind, about looking back, about what we let people do to us and about how we look at ourselves after the storm clears. I’ve always tried to live in a habit of forgiveness, but for the first time in my life I can’t find it anywhere within me. I have nothing left to give, there is nothing left to say that would change how things happened and where we are now - there is no redemption in these poems, so do not look for it.
The final time I spoke to him I said that I felt like there had been an explosion, and that for a long time I would be painfully pulling splinters from every aspect of my life – well this feels like one hell of a splinter. To him all I can now say is that I’m okay - thank you for not asking.
She
Is she a girl who leaves a haze of perfumed air as she walks by?
Her things were in your bathroom,
Brazen in their position, a dusky quiet pink,
Mocking.
Feminine bear trap left to snap shut on my bare feet.
No shoes allowed in the flat.
I picture her positioning these land mines, smiling to herself,
Nailing the coffin shut from 10,000 miles away.
In your bed, in your bath, on the balcony,
How many times did you squirm inside her?
Rooting out your bohemia again and again and again,
I sit at home, ask if she’s enjoying London,
Yes, she is.
She knew about me.
Knew my name, knew who I was.
I spoke to her through you – what is her star sign?
Aquarius.
Water bearer.
A poisoned chalice, I drink willingly, blindly
from your hands.
‘She helps me in a way that is inconceivable in the west’,
Did she do the dishes after you fucked?
Quiet creature,
Impossibly thin,
Previously impossible in my mind altogether.
You said her name to me before I knew,
Why did it not turn into bitter bile in your mouth?
Say our names in the same breath,
Taste the ash, the filth,
Try to seek your shame.
I bled after you told me,
Unexpected, untimely.
Refusing to open my own veins,
My womb rung itself out,
Bleeding you out of me,
My woman’s pain running between my legs
Why is the blood on my hands?
Your hands are far away, clean,
Same hands that wiped the tears from my face,
So gentle,
Right after ripping the flesh from my bones
The quiet from my mind.
Did those salted drops cleanse you?
I think not.
________________________________________________
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Will it be her next?
Maybe you’ll treat her better
Because she’ll treat you worse
Is that what you needed?
You took a train out of the city.
It’s rained every day this week
There was thunder today,
Followed by golden evening light
I wanted to tell you
But you are far away in another golden county
Another golden time.
Stay in that past,
Stay behind that gilded shroud.
[Untitled]
‘What? What are you looking at?’
‘You’
Drink me in then until there’s nothing left,
Take it all, please, God knows I don’t want it.
Brown eyes that move from rest to
Sharp surprise at inexplicable moments,
Eyes of a wild thing first,
Eyes of a caged animal later.
________________________________________________
December, Boscastle
Bowl of stars pricking their way through the salty darkness,
Distant tide swells and collapses away into the night,
‘If you look at the sky for long enough you’re guaranteed to see a shooting star’
Have you ever seen those balls of flame burn so bright, so far away?
They feel closer than before, particularly tonight
Our breath turns air to cloud, we were making rain before we even sensed the storm
That night I did actually see a shooting star, bursting across the cold sky,
I had hoped and been granted.
Driving in your car through the pitch icy midnight
Nothing to see, only silence to hear, nature cracks her knuckles and the night presses nearer
But with you I am safe, you won’t let anything hurt me
I close my eyes on the journey back, trusting you to find the way
I don’t need to grapple through the darkness to find home
I’m already there.
***
So crash the car and let the metal twist around me
Metallic branches of willow take me in your arms
And I will grow roots to this place,
To that shooting star and that look in your eyes
Then I can be a memorial to these moments
I can be a home for you, bones snapped and wrought with metal.
A grave on the Cornish coast,
Come back from time to time and visit your sweetheart
Enshrined after the fire
You won’t know the shape of me anymore,
Perhaps you’ll feel a flicker of home.
Darling you did crash the car,
So come sing to the metallic willow,
She waits,
But now must refuse to sing back.
________________________________________________
Circles
June
I met you at a party and honey I knew right away,
We found an acid bottle of wine under the sink,
Laughing, went walking out into the misty yellow dawn,
Brushing my hands on leaves, you telling me their names,
Later that afternoon I walk home mostly barefoot,
Spinning ecstatically in my senses, in strange freedom.
See you around maybe.
November
Meet you on the bridge, 9 o’clock in time for the fireworks,
Lost and late as usual, we find each other at last, look up.
Coloured fire streaks the sky, standing high above black rushing water,
Rather an appropriate beginning wasn’t it?
Later sitting close together in a crowded pub,
Cheeks flushed, cold hands, words rushing out,
Had we both saved 21 years of things to say?
December
This might be my favourite memory;
The afternoon before the party we go for lunch
On the way home we acquire a seven foot Christmas tree,
Carrying it home between us we’re helpless with laughter,
Laughing all night, sometimes you sit and draw,
Sometimes you tell the story and I look at you,
Shining across the room, I am so unbelievably happy.
January
I wake to the New Year in your arms,
Spending all day in bed between sleeping and waking,
Maybe this will be the year, I think to myself.
Later we stand in the middle of a stone circle,
Climb the highest hill and can see for miles,
Golden sunlight bathes England’s patchwork
And for a few moments everything is timeless,
Nothing could sour, rot, decay, not here and not you.
February
One ordinary day we take the ordinary walk,
Your hands are fidgety and you have to go,
Rush away then love, whilst I walk home in silent tears,
I plant seeds in the garden, knowing what comes next.
Later an evening walk that drags on until night,
You’re leaving me.
For Japan, for your freedom, for an easier life
With less noise and less guilt,
See you around maybe.
March
Darling you were never going to leave that party,
Lock the door and leave your shoes on,
Returning to the crowd newly affected by a subtle shift,
Happy, happy birthday, I’m 22 and the world rocks beneath me
With nothing to grip onto I just let myself go
You, me, us again – why the hell not?
May
You left on the most beautiful morning of the year,
I watched planes strike out across the great blue beyond,
You had said goodbye to me and I had seen it in your eyes,
That great undefinable it, and there was at last peace in letting you go.
Women have been doing this for centuries.
A week later I left too, struck out for the countryside,
For the green and the gold (baby, baby it’s a wild world),
To feel nature move in and around me
And by being alone, knowing I was never alone.
Summer
Write me from the cities,
Write me from the fields,
I’ll write you from the manor house,
From the sea.
Returning to where we met,
I throw my arms in the sky again,
Same freedom, different feeling.
The great circle has turned and baby I’m still yours.
August
Both barrelling back into the city,
Crashing back into each other,
I remember how I wondered if this would be the year,
There are still a few months,
And this month I would be so happy once again,
Feeling us settling into each other,
My every question mark disappearing one by one,
I lay down beside you in the quiet and finally finally it was enough.
September
On the first day of the first autumn month,
You told me about her and what you had done,
You were leaving me for good this time,
We both cried, but it was my world that lay in pieces around me
Careful not to cut yourself on the shards.
Goodbye,
Goodbye,
I can’t imagine where I would see you again.
However many times we would have orbited around each other,
However many times repeated this circle,
However many years spent pushing at pulling at one another,
I don’t think you would have ever let me give you everything I tried to,
Never let me within the holy ring you keep around yourself,
Keep the circle turning love,
Winter, spring, summer, autumn,
Winter,
Spring,
Summer,
Autumn
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