The Last Rose

     
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She only wanted

to be loved like the last rose,

it wasn’t a lot to ask,

and she showed you exactly how

to love her; her present,

her future,

…her past,

it wasn’t any ability

that you lacked,

you were not incapable

of filling

unconventional cracks and the voids that she mentioned,

it was only that you didn’t

pay her enough attention, to learn all the

littlest things;

and so if you have never seen

her sing,

while she

cooks dinner,

never seen her spin around

and dance,

when she changes the sheets -

perhaps it is only

because you were asleep,

when she asked you to know her.

And if you wonder,

what she looks like

on a freedom-kissed beach,

or how strong she is whenever

she reaches,

the top,

of an arduous climb,

or what she wears,

indoors,

on a lazy,

Saturday night…if you don’t know her,

makeup-less,

with hair, tied, in a bun,

or soaked, and tanned, and wild,

under

a beating,

foreign sun,

perhaps it is because you never got done,

making her feel, like that

very,

last rose:

…most beautiful and cherished and plenty…to you,

being whichever ‘her’,

she chose. 

    

Not All The Time

 
Something. Sometimes.
And then, not much.
Sometimes, reached for, and
sometimes, untouched, unspoken,
inconstant, undone...
sometimes, the moon,
...then pushed away
by the sun;
and yet;
here,
and bringing,
only love,
never waxing, nor waning,
it fits
like a glove of
satin, a tender caress,
one hour: more
the next; less, than ever,
made small
un-needed,
footprints in a soul and a heart:
bleeding,
when it is not
quietly
sleeping,
in the warmth
of an honest embrace - when
it cannot, smile
and press it's face,
to the safety,
of a rhythmic chest...
breathing calmly, in a feather-bed
nest,
as certain
as the stars will shine...
given,
over
wholly,
to something
that need not
be defined.
   

Fresh

    

In the twilight, I slipped back

between the sheets,

where I tried to re-enter

my precious sleep, in the empty

space I was expected to be, now that the sun

was rising. A deepening orange,

heated the horizon,

and victoriously, heralded day,

and I knew I was no longer

supposed to need,

all those creases, carelessly made -

I was supposed to pretend and turn away,

from that which I knew to be right, supposed to

see now, the fading night,

as something erased, by dawn. And it was not so

easy then to stay warm; amongst those illicit, untidy thoughts,

without some assurance

inside. I rolled and stretched; a chained sort of sigh;

buried my face and tried to hide,

as the light,

slid deft fingers between the curtains.

Only one thing was all too certain,

when I could bring myself, to draw them :

a crescent moon, hung stubborn, in the morning,

golden against the sky –

and loyally, it hung there ‘til lunchtime,

to remind me, that it

would remember, and keep,

the night.

If You Touch Me

   

Please,
go gentle, if you touch me,
today there’s too much to break,
don’t you see these cracks
crawling over
my face, like feathers,
all crumpled and slight? Go tender, if you touch me,
as though brushing starlight with your fingers,
and drawing it near, if you scold me, go quietly,
and whisper
for fear that I startle
too swiftly this day, though if your touch
offers safety,
I will want you;
...go careful,
but stay
    

and make this moment a shelter,
a home, a hide,
for I feel nought but a bird now,
so lost in dark night, and oh, so open,
to being eaten
alive, if you touch me,
say ‘precious’, say ‘shield’, for I give you all I beg,
all I borrow
and steal, that keeps me here,
in weakness, revealed,
with no lies to detect;
please,
if you touch me, say ‘encircle’,
say ‘protect’, and I’ll listen, and I promise
to believe;
   

please,
if you touch me,
don’t be too rough,
don’t pull me, don’t push me, don’t
…rush;
this air and this noise is already harsh enough
to bruise, and to batter
and scrape;
    

please, if you touch me,
just
lay
something like the truth on my skin:
that I am more than this moment;
this flaw;
   

that I am still everything.
    

Forgotten

There was thick
mud that day
as I slid, and slipped
my way, along the steep ravine to you;
as I did the things
that were asked of me,
that, right then, I did not want to do.
    

I looked upon the bottom
of a tree, roots entangled; an evergreen; a place that had always been to me,
a spot called clear to mind;
the place your dust rested,
in the shape of a cross,
in a year gone far behind.
    

I laid the roses
I didn’t want
to lay; and I said words I had not
prepared to say,
and I kissed my fingers in a dutiful way, and
pressed them
to the freezing ground. And then I turned around,
and climbed the sticky hill, shaking legs and an iron
will, not a tear nor a trace
would show.
     

And I walked away, triumphant; ready to go,
when a voice called out: ‘Not there…no.’
And it went on: ‘That’s not the place.
No, the ashes were never
spread that way. That wasn’t what they had to say…
you recall it all so 
wrong.’ And I tried to remember; even just which
song, was played the first
and last – and all I could hear
was the shattering of glass, as I realised each effort
drew a blank,
from the darkest corner of my mind.
    

I had no memories of any kind; it seemed all I’d known
were self-told lies, and today I cannot even find, the truth
about the colour
of the box
we laid you in.
But I think I remember
what you were wearing.
And I see lilies
and roses
when I close my eyes;
on the nights when I am lucky enough,
not to see
the moments
before you died. I remember those
the best.
    

I’m sorry…
I didn’t mean to.
I seem to have forgotten the rest.