Saturday 20 August 2011

Wednesday 20 April 2011

Baby bird

Don't give up on me just yet.
Baby birds can't fly from birth,
You know,
And I am learning.

Every feather quivers, when I shiver in whatever weather wuthers round my mother while she feeds me and my brothers.
I want to wing it with her but my withered wings can't cover all beloved winds I covet
- Like a lover I would love it - but I'm not capable of it.
May I never see another day
May mother take my wings away
If I don't learn to play the wind
So don't give up on me just yet
I swear I'm learning

Tuesday 19 April 2011

Kites

Maybe we are like kites
And it would be as sad for us to escape
As it would be if we were to give up.

Sunday 17 April 2011

Meander

It's hard to leave sometimes
All peoplefull and hectic and
Like a warm bath I have to
Heave myself out
Leave
Cool down outside and I
Go for a walk and my
Shadow paints the ground
It can get in the locked park
Runs over the flowerbeds
Climbs trees I can't don't won't climb
I used to do this all the the time
That's why it's mine
I think I can hear people talking
In the grass centre of the park
Maybe they think I'm walking my dog
(I wag my tail at that)
I know that the moon is copper or bronze
And I know the fences don't apply
And I know they will ask me why
Why I went wandering
And I won't say how nice it was to walk in a straight line.

Thursday 14 April 2011

Roath park

Grey sky. Swan wing
(thunderclaps against water)
ash and blossom
petal concentrics on the glass.

Lake
lake is of a moment
willowdipped fingers

and more every
Time
stands still
and more
lake

Wednesday 13 April 2011

Three poems

I learned to walk the tightrope
With ghost feet.
Walking the line on cold toes
From up here you all look like gods
Like warm legends
Blooded and brilliant.
At least I can keep an eye on you all
And at least I don't f

~ ~ ~

Live happy ever after, somewhere far away from me,
Somewhere you can love each other well and I won't have to see.
I'm sorry this is bitter but I'm trying to be kind,
'Cause even though she has your heart I know I'm on your mind.

I know I'm on your mind the same way you're always on mine.
I don't read too much into how you text me all the time
But you make your feelings clear with every single thing you say,
So go live happy ever after, somewhere far away.

~ ~ ~
Dreadlocks
Are pretty terrible.
Yes they are.
They may look cool in theory
But in practise they are a bit gross
And frizzy.
I'm really sorry guys.
Don't be offended
I think you're awesome
But I am so excited about the day you eventually cut them off.
Other hairstyles are available
And infinitely more caressable.

Sunday 10 April 2011

Bonfire in a bin

Hungry arms lick the bin
And I think for a minute that they reach for me
To pull me in,
Climbing up the wood,
Spitting sparks in spite
The planks ignite.
It hates me, I think.
I watch in wonder at the brightness,
Fire flung in fury, cursing my name
The same flame that killed countless of my kind, kept many alive too.
Destruction is its duty
And I am duly consumed by its beauty.

Saturday 9 April 2011

Land

We are all african, but I don't feel it.
I come from the secret garden,
That lost orchard-England of petticoats and farthings,
Of starlings and strawberries.
We are all young, but I don't feel it.
I know the old forest in my bones, the boar and stags
and
Stages of clearing clearings.
I know the huts and houses, horses and hounds that bent to our iron and will and still I feel the steel of what we are
Man works by hand and works the land, I understand.
We are all now,
But I don't know it. All times are mine.

Friday 8 April 2011

FINISHED!

YES
I heard you
The first time
You told me
To pick up the laundry and pick up the pace and tidy my bedroom and reach out to space
"Work hard, and make your future fall in line"
I heard you.
The first time!
I appreciate encouragement,
And I admire your drive
But why've you made it your mission
To make me thrive?

I can't poem, I have alcohol in me.

Thursday 7 April 2011

Scars and wrinkles

Life has played games with my skin
Kept notes on it
Left memos: oh by the way
You fell and you bled here.
You grew too fast.
You burned and were scarred. You hurt and were scared.
You learned
At last
I've turned into a notebook
Or the back of an envelope.
Life has made maps of me.
I said I'd die unblemished,
But tattoos chose me,
Piercings found me
(thumbtack in my palm,
One prick requiring another in my arm to stave off tetanus)
So now I am covered with story,
Unchosen glory,
And every section's gory imperfections
Serve as answers to my questions.
Life's little lectures as living reflections of
Who I have been until now,
Somehow.
And sometimes when I'm looking in the mirror
I see glimmers of the woman that I'm one day going to be.
Neat crow's feet to remind me
That laughter lies behind me
It's lined me already.

Day 6 is a sorry one

Sorry it's a day late.
I'm not the most reliable
Person in the world,
A fact that's undeniable
However hard I try
I find I'm always liable
To postpone and procrastinate
Until it isn't viable.

Sorry this is late,
I got a bit distracted
And the words inside my head
Just couldn't be extracted
And this one-a-day idea
Has had some worth subtracted
But i've not packed it in this morning, I've acted.

Tuesday 5 April 2011

"You guys is dicks, I have untold value."

They've tried to sell me, so they say,
Debating my merits as table or whore.
Claiming they've paid Jay to kill me:
"For the right price, I'll do anything."
"That's what his business cards say!"
The crueler they are,
The more crass and offensive,
The closer we get as a group.
I feel lucky to know people who'll ridicule and slander me
The way this lot do.
They're good people
Once you get past the whole sex offender thing.

Monday 4 April 2011

Drag

It's all a drag act.
Fake femininity,
Aspiring to maintain
The dream of divinity
Goddess, Oh limit me:
Appearance, demeanour and voice,
The pedestal trinity.
I learn to sway the hips, to paint my lips,
Extranatural
Like a billboard larger-than-life.
As long as you want me I'm worth it
As long as I'm fake then I'm perfect
Servicing standards unfeasibly high
Oh woman, you're one when you learn how to lie.

Sunday 3 April 2011

The Bass

Most nights my line is "I can't dance, I'm fine" but tonight I can't stop 'cause this music is mine.
There's a buzz to it.
A fuzzy tremble-beat beneath my feet
And with every fibre humming
It's so sweet to feel complete in the movement, in a moment of becoming.
It commemorates the muse in me,
Amusing me:
Are all the ways
I jerk and sway
A kind of praise?

Especially I treasure the lack of inner pressure;
I do it at my leisure
My time
My place
My change of pace, this perfect space.
The roar in the floor
The call in the wall
The bass.

Saturday 2 April 2011

Week starts again

I’m afraid of the life I have built for myself.
It’s left me with nowhere to go.
The twist in my chest tells me so.
I’m fighting the fright every sunday night.
The terror takes hold of me then -
And the week starts all over again.

And there’s deadlines to meet
And there’s errands to run
I take too many breaks
And I have too much fun
There’s too much distraction from everyone
I start making progress, I’m coping, and then
The week starts again
The week starts again.

Friday 1 April 2011

Write A Poem Every Day In April: Invisible.

Inspired by Taylor Mali's idea of writing a poem every day in April, and helped along by the high amount of poeming my brain's been doing lately, I thought I'd join in. I hope you like it! This first one's a bit negative, yes, but it works much better to music. I hope to get a video camera one day, then I can show you what it's meant to sound like!

Over and under and round me and through me
You never quite saw me, you never quite knew me
I’m not blind, I know you’ve been flirting with fellas
And yes I’m a lady, and yes I am jealous.
It’s stupid, it’s pointless, it makes me feel foolish,
But I think you knew this,
Is that why you do this?
I’m sorry
I’m sorry
You’ve made yourself clear.
Not needed, not wanted, I’ll just disappear.
Over and under and through me and round me
Invisible just because nobody found me.

Wednesday 23 February 2011

Butterflies

I am here,
And he is here,
And something else is here too -
That bungee jump, about-to-step-on-stage feeling.
The crucial moment, fight or flight?
The twisty, hopping, what’s-about-to-happen feeling
That they call
Butterflies.

I am there,
And he is there,
And butterflies are everywhere their wings all tangled in my hair
And, acting like I don’t much care,
I dare to touch...
But not too much.

Synapses firing and failing, I’m flailing for something to say
But “we never did too much talkin’ anyway,
And don’t think twice,” ’cause when I do I run away
And I want to stay.
I kind of like this guy,

But best I like the butterflies that tell me “Yes,
Be afraid and Be alive and Be young for once.”
The butterflies that cloud my eyes
With sugar-gem brightness
And almost hide that common sense is
Telling me: maintain pretences.
Warning me: don’t drop defences; you built the fences for times like this.

So I’ll try and pretend that the thrill’s lost,
That the butterflies died with the first frost,
That the cost was too high.
I’m trying not to show –
Trying not to see those things with fragile stained-glass-window-wings
Thronging the room from the back of my head to the front.

So, I am there.
And he is there.
The butterflies are everywhere.
And I’m still trying not to show – but no. I have to go.
I walk home to a cold bed
And turn it over in my head, the things he did and things I said,
’Cause when you pin it down, it dies,
And I must kill the butterflies.

Now this is nearly perfect ’cause I don't know how to end it, how to make the flutters
Still.
But I will.