Naming beach huts is an art form; forget the colour you want to paint it, name it with a legacy in mind. A morning walk isn’t a morning walk until at least five people walking their dogs say, Good morning. If the thought You should wear a hat crosses your mind before you leave the … Continue reading Ten Things
She paid more attention to bird song this week. She heard it at six am and how it had changed by nine. She heard it in the car park after work, she heard it in the trees outside. She heard it at night when she was running a bath. She does not know which … Continue reading She Listened
I like listening to the rain and watching the warm street lamp glow melt into the window frame. Sometimes I hear footsteps too, the distant rumble of traffic and the echoes of birds. I can see the chimney of my neighbour’s house and I can see a magpie or pigeon (they visit most frequently) has … Continue reading Chimney Grass
Small and feral. Green knees and knotty hair, Nanny’s little devil; bumbling without a care along the concrete stones with mossy edges and busy ant homes. How she longed to be feather light, paper transparent and magical within and without. To blink and merge with vivid climbers scaling varnished heights. Her tissue paper skin grazed … Continue reading The Fairy Garden
At the beginning of twenty eighteen, I used a jigsaw metaphor to describe how complete and incomplete I felt. Upon reading this, my Mother said, ‘You know you never find all of the pieces of the jigsaw, right?’ I rolled my eyes, said ‘I know’ when really I was adamant it wasn’t true at all. … Continue reading Age 24
One Boxing Day I wrote about a father and son visiting a grave. I hoped with my words I could manifest enough love or tape to fix the hurt they no doubt felt. Since then, I’ve learnt the holes in human hearts cannot be darned like socks. The holes we make are not always perfect … Continue reading Without Strings
After failing to heed my therapist’s advice not to open them all at once, I stopped. I cleared away the mess ‘Friendship’, ‘Love’ and ‘Work’ had made and left ‘Childhood’ on the table. It stayed like that for days; like a baby elephant in the room with all of the gold edges becoming unstuck. A … Continue reading Four Boxes: Childhood
My doorway glitters with gold, as if the sun set molten and flooded the sea and then my house to leave each surface flecked with rays and pockets of light. What I really see is your shadow shrinking but your smile still lingers in mine and your hands still hold onto mine. Everything still glistens, … Continue reading Gold
Her hands are the shadow of the little girl hidden behind adult clothes and a career. Still, she holds them palms up, waiting. Or she grapples with the ropes of a pulley system she will never master; it always ends with a make shift noose. Her hands are blistered from carrying the coals she … Continue reading Little Girl Hidden
It is strange. Of all the places I wear the red tutu the most, it is in the bath or by the sea. My ghost prefers to be near water. Perhaps the translucency, baring the skin and bones of all who venture in, helps it feel less alone. Or it sways in the coastal breeze … Continue reading Mermaid
