This terrible beating, a soundless roar that I
wear like worry. Caught in lace and sequin,
you stupid pretty thing.
Heart, you are so
devilishly ugly.

You make me awful and needful.
A trouble, an aching break that
never healed right.
Pitchfork and shrapnel jacket, a barbed wire
beauty.

I am disastrous and made of weeds. A hungry throat that
only knows
swallow.

Go on sky,
pour. The art of breath and walk,
of continue,
of live.
Of lust for better.
Awake a sugar glass
soul made tender.

I am great care, building scaffoldings between fistfight and belonging.

You're across
An ocean swell
You're across
A boat's plough crushing
Waves down down

You're beyond
An island crowned in orange cloud
Seagulls busy dancing tangos
On the greasy wind.

You're way past
The strokes of spits of sand saliva
Of palm trees clapping coconuts
Making feigned horsehoove beats
To bring the waves a shouting match.
Roars clean the salty, dry air.

You've passed,
The shallow castles
Of whale dens,
Keeping ships in new homes
Wooden kin with keels and ribs
Flies and jibs.

You're not here, that's for sure,
But,
I feel you,
Maybe somehow.
I do.

Mum had been gone a couple of months, six I think… (An ordinary day. Feeling hollow but doing OK) …when I realized I could get rid of the sofa.

I thought it was ugly. She thought it was a bargain. A sofa’s not a keepsake and it was certainly no heirloom. I’d not inflict it on my kids. I got rid.

If I could’ve had her back then? I would’ve done. Even if it meant keeping the sofa.

Redecorated. Bought a new telly. Spent frivolous amounts of cash on scatter cushions. She disliked scatter cushions. I thought they were cosy.

My little boy drew on one of the cushions. On purpose. I was about to smack the back of his legs… (Mum would have. She smacked me when I was little) … but I stopped.

I never wanted to. I had known all along, somehow forgotten.

If I could’ve had her back then? I would’ve done. But she would not smack my children.

Mum had been gone a year… (Planting bulbs. Feeling conspicuous carrying a shovel ‘round the churchyard) …and I missed her .

It was as hot as the day she died. There was no breeze up on that hill. No cloud. Beautiful views stretched right out to the sea.

My little boy had grown. He helped carry water and dig holes. My baby was learning to walk. She wobbled on uneven turf between the headstones. I wanted Mum to see.

If I could’ve had her back then? I would’ve done. No question.


Mum had been gone three years… (Bulbs were doing OK. There was nothing left to plant that rabbits wouldn't nibble) …and I realized it was time to move on.

I kept the ghosts quiet while agents showed people round. The house sold. We moved away. A warm, terraced place in a small town by the sea. Dad died.

Mum has been gone eight years and I miss her.

Looking out from the Downs across cliff-top and sea, the churchyard seems nothing more than a soft-grey fleck on the green edge of town.

If I could bring her back now? Everything’s changed.

Ghosts exist. They sit in empty chairs and speak kettle-whistle. Wishing us well.

I woke up with gloomy dreams,
A pretty face I remember,
She had the vive of a queen,
While I was the slave of cold December.

Dream again, I ask my heart and mind,
Fading images meant this story's end,
So my eyes wore a sailor's dress,
Searching for a lost pile of sand.

The minutes of that dream shaped my hours dull,
With no awe in this life , I waited for her call,
I became what they call incorrigible,
As this desert heart now needed a last rainfall,

I never asked for her lover's heart,
Just to watch her skip my heartbeat,
Nor craved for those moonlight lips,
As I spend a lifetime watching our eyes meet.

The dream may never come,
Her sunset eyes may never rise,
For the sake of my capacious heart, I still close my eyes,
To live a thousand deaths to once see her blue sunset eyes.

So long is
a long time
coming,
shortly is
just
the same.

The rain it pooled deep within the leaf, the hollow
and drank there - insect, vole and swallow
along a mud and marshy path, my feet for to follow
and tread upon the lichen moss, I sank softly greening
watching all the day, the trickling of the woodland trees
the light that breathed there glistening.