2022.13 Collagen

#ContentWarning for implied abusive relationships, torture, nightmares. Look after yourselves.

I still bear your scars, in more ways than one.
I have to hope you were having fun when you made them;
what’s the point in hurting if you can’t laugh about it?
This detail still eludes me.

I have to hope you were having fun when you made them
watch your descent, step by aching step,
pain etched into innocent nerve-endings.

What’s the point in hurting if you can’t laugh about it,
tribulation promising a prop, a stopping of obscurity.
It lies.

This detail still eludes me,
fevered dreams reaching into my waking, saying:
punishment works both ways. You need to finish it. Enough.

Found this on Google Images. Apparently it comes from Adobe by kucherav.

Dark mood today after some serious conversations, need to let this one out; hope it helped. If you recognise yourself in any part of this, please seek support. Seriously.

Anyway, this is a trimeric, which I saw Leanne Moden use elsewhere, and decided to give it a go. It’s also now available as a form on the Concrete and Repeating Forms Spreadsheet.

2020.4 Driven Fast

Using the @PoetrySyntax prompt for Day 5 of “drive by” we have this curiosity (probably more drive-through than drive-by, but hey):

We were a casual thing –
Light touch, sunshine-fleet,
Blink-and-you’ll-miss-it.
You said it was for the best.

I agreed. It’s in my nature –
Once a waiter, always a
Waiter, deference like a
Reflex, asking, never telling.

You ordered white bread for the table,
Sparkling water with a wedge of lemon,
Scanned the specials board
But stuck to the hunter’s chicken.

I couldn’t help but crave
Something slower,
Time to savour,
Rich flavours given their own space.

My mouth watered for
Mezze, citrus and pomegranate,
High notes combined with the
Dusk of game meat.

At night, I’d dream
The squeal of tires,
Awake singing Big Yellow Taxi
As I started circling in attendance.

Full, but echoing, missing nutrition,
I listened and nodded,
Wishing and waiting
For something other than snacks.

The day I realised
The menu held more options
Was otherwise ordinary
But a stranger’s smile ignited revolution.

Living in the endless expectation
Of your say-so,
Alert to your every message,
Was never fun, but unjust punishment.

I will seek out gastronomic
Experiences, fast and slow alike,
Put in my requests with a smile
Dial my own whims in my own time.

2019.6 A List of Things

Things That Bring Smiles

You breeze through the door;
You rock sideways in your seat,
Bursting with rockets.

Things That Won’t Leave

That sparkly bath bomb;
Grand National 2010;
Hair dye fingerprints.

Things You Don’t Remember

How I take my tea;
Open crisps: invitation;
That Grand National.

Things That Wake Me Up

Slammed doors – car or house;
My name, a kind hand stroking;
You suppressing tears.

Things That Send Me To Sleep

A kind hand, stroking;
Your voice shares that well-loved book;
Crackling woodfire.

Things That Bring Tears 

Too much compassion;
Sister Act: that one high note;
July’s final gasp.

Things That Spark Poetry

Injustice; work stress;
Family; love; eavesdropping;
Pivoting seasons;
Memories of home; the sea;
At the right time: anything.

Already falling behind my self-imposed target of two per day for the rest of the month, but I continue to strive with this Pillow Book-style poem (thanks for the prompt, NaPoWriMo), done as six senryū stanzas and one tanka, because that seemed appropriate for the original material.

2019.4 Ghost Tour

“Will you cover for me?” I’m helpless, delving into a set of well-worn expressions, shunning the stutter he beckons, projecting: Yeah, I reckon. “Listen,” he says, “I owe you one.” At this point, more like twenty, a reckoning that’s chasing propriety into an early grave. A new voice: “Step lively,” says Greg, head a conspiracy tilt past the fire hatch and we scurry, him stubbing, me shrugging, Greg’s gaze a spinning speculation I nudge from him. “Madame’s on the march,” he confides. I sigh. “No closer to the prize?” My turn to roll my eyes, grab regulation headgear, unprop the door while trawling for witticisms. Zilch. “There’s always next time.” “Sure, love. Sure.” We watch as he darts ahead.

Tip-toeing upstage,
We are mismatched murderers
Longing for a break.


Over to our old friend the random line generator for inspiration for this not-very-strict haibun, Words generated were: cover, march, listen, tip, upstage, point, chase, ghosts.

2017.30 - Conflagration

I ask you what to write about
You ponder, eyes crinkling;
“Write about a fire,” you say,
I smile, but do not ask: what type?

There have been so many:
The sparks whirling in the dark
Pinprick kisses hinting
The caress of greater heat…

The open, clay-cupped crackle
Of night-time conversations,
The unfurling barbecue scent
Of easy summer chatter…

The turfed-in glow of trust,
Banked to last for ages,
The open-throated roar
Of wildfire, raging, consuming…

The thin, flickering reconciliation
Of candlelight, breaths held,
The steady, everyday production
Of the forge’s rhythm…

And, central to our orbit,
The song and slumber of the hearth,
Breathing the miracle of home,
The warmth we’ve built together.


And that’s it, folks - the final poem of this year’s NaPoWriMo/ GloPoWriMo. Thanks for following along, hope you’ve had a good month, and I’ll see you next time!

2015.5 - Gifts of Groaning

You are a taste in the throat,
A shape in the hands
Born of the ways
I waited for you,
Pulled through my palms
Like a star rope,
Sticky with expectations.

I cleave to, heave-ho
The mainbrace of our sailing weather
Uncertain if we're better together,
Shipwrecked,
Or a crystal split,
Calling us history, clever wrecks,
Wracked now by waves.

My mind now is heightened,
And I will call all the ways we spoke
Brave, or knavery,
Depending on the direction
Of the next fourteen seconds,
Because I don't want to be
A port in a storm,
Formed for idleness,
Repairs, and slow regrets.

_____________

Written as pretty much a atreawm of consciousness after reading Poppy's latest poem, so I've no idea what flavours she brewed there… Thanks, Poppy!

2015.3 - Invidious Kisses

Lines from the Random Line Generator: 

glasseye kiss frosty river angel mildew storm drain glasseye 
radiant mistyrose shimmer asphyxia white jungle firefly icicle 

Where's #2, I hear you ask? It's written, but I need permission from the person who accidentally supplied the first line.

____________________

Sometimes it feels like
I have two glass eyes,
One scrimshawed with
All the lies you told me.

You called me your angel;
I am losing my laden wings
To a mire of mildew,
Radiance reduced to a firefly glimmer.

This misty shimmer is
Not what you think it is -
My heart is frost-cracked,
An expanding drain of hope.

You named me, so
You must claim me -
Angels are not just
Decorations.

I rose from a white storm.
I am all the non-conforming corners,
All the hot and rooted tangle
Of jungle, the enduring fist of tundra.

And we were armed once -
Swords and scimitars -
And I will rise hard,
An icicle to pierce your indolence.

It's not the fight I fear -
It's the asphyxia that stutters
Every time you
Hold me near.

#20 In Place of Truth

I keep telling people that "I don't do sonnets" (or rhyme, or comedy, or iambic n-ameter). I thought I'd give it another go, this being the month of poetic challenges and all:

You ask me what I'd like to do today
I know I should just tell you all my heart
I find it very difficult to say
That I would like to spend this time apart.

I love you, dear, with every breath I draw
You light up my existence, this I swear
But sometimes I need peace and quiet and more -
It's only solitude that I can bear.

"Give me one day!" I very nearly cry
I gather up my strength to say out loud:
"I cannot miss you when you're always by"
But it turned out that I made not one sound

I wandered lonely, drowned in company
My cowardice had triumphed over me.

#8 Catharsis

You are the runaway horse
To which I strap my ire
From time to time.

Reclining on a fat cushion of
"There but for the grace of..."
Well... who will ever know...?

You are cut out of ply,
Ragged-edged,
A pledge to the future

You occupy sly corners
Of my psyche
A shouting sandtrap

That era was exhausting
A forced march through
The further ends of every Bell Curve

You gave me these things:
Assonance, orgasms,
New definitions of arrogance

Consider this a thank-you note
For, if nothing else,
A kind of immunity.

This is dedicated to all those who will know what I mean today when I say "fucking BEIGE".

If you don't want to be in a poem, don't fuck (with) a poet.

#26 Carousel

This originally had a very different final stanza. I like it a lot better now.

I may be confusing you
With summer days -
Eyes for gazing into,
Reflecting endless skies,
The dart and shift-skimmer
Of dragonfly laughter, a voice
Lilting as a breeze
Through heavy nights.

I think I might be mixing you
With spring - fresh beginnings,
Cold giving way to colour,
Toil giving way to hope,
The scope of one sun-smiling hour
Gilded with infinity
Amid the shifting light.

It's possible that I've
Intermingled you with
Autumn nights -
The exhilarating spin
Of wind-bellow crashing
Mellowed afternoons,
The swish of vibrant signs
Kicked up and caught in books.

It occurs to me that we
Stand gripped as if in
Winter's stark, metallic absolutes,
Rooted in the waiting earth,
The silence of anticipation,
The deep and simple choices,
The dreamtime gathering of strength
Before the promised thaw.