after Kait Quinn The girl, the husk powdery to touch, frightened of fear and the secrets it keeps. The awe in my eyes when I see you, stitched in the elegant bow of willow trees. Love and beauty, the kingdom of frost melting into mid-july, the childhood of us. The begging, words thick with dust, … Continue reading What are you letting go of?
she meant sometimes the trees seem to whisper every name but yours, and the bluetits titter as the sun rises and sets each day as if mocking your inability to make anyone smile; or the lack of warmth you feel even within your own bones. She meant sometimes love is too short and too sudden; … Continue reading When Sara Bareilles sung ‘she is lonely most of the time’:
My mind, the corner I have kept for you has become a shrine I no longer wish to visit yet heed and pray before each night. My prayers are not gifts nor sweet nothings; they are not even prayers. They are misshapen thoughts, ounces of love without weight. There is nothing for me here anymore … Continue reading Ghosts in black coats
Moonlight shimmers across cobbled courts and Notre-Dame stands stoic in silence; omniscient and omnipotent, stained-glass eyes watching the Seine move beneath the twinkle of stars, the Eiffel Tower and the streets. Men with roses harangue tourists, but we are all seventeen and this is no time to love like strangers at midnight, our bellies full … Continue reading Paris, 2011.
after Jericho Brown When people ask when I first began to write, I think of the walls I first ran my greasy fingers along. The homes I would never call my own but would be called home by everyone who knew me. I knew the walls though - the peeling paint and the damp. I … Continue reading A poem is a gesture toward home
You arrived at the beginning of me, a life spent so lonely in quarantine, bobbing in the breeze so effortlessly, bubbles pop blue like the sky and the sea. I watch you come in twos and threes, loved up in ruffled up feathers and yellow smiles; swallowing the sunshine, golden syrup, before drifting upon the … Continue reading A Sonnet for Bluetits
after Sylvia Plath Silence shudders through the room, yet I find forgiveness, whilst carving sculpture into my tomb. We love like gargoyles in gloom, painted grins for hearts bleeding. Silence shudders through the room. I search for bones and flesh, a womb to call my own, whilst whittling sculpture into my tomb. … Continue reading Mad Girl’s Love Song
I haven't written about being in the bath in a while. Larkin wrote about lambs whilst I write about the pink between my toes; wondering if when I was born I knew I would be raised for the slaughter. My lamb eyes blinking, drinking in the sun. Until I learned how to drink bathwater. … Continue reading My lamb heart
My pale, baby face blooms unseen in your bedroom mirror; I watch you, beautiful woman who is not yet mine, dancing in the scent of summer and hypnotised by half moon shadows playing across creaky floorboards. It's Friday night and you shake off those playground blues, put on your high heeled shoes, too dark … Continue reading Friday nights with you, before me
My redhead skin smells the thunder and says thank you; tastes rain in the wind and smiles - opens its stretch marks like smiles not hand-me-downs from sad days, lets the water trickle like glitter or confetti - my redhead skin feels loved. Despite my burnished shoulders, lobster red rather than gold, I know this … Continue reading Redhead
