A Word in your ear…
Below are some of the submissions for Warwick Words Writers Group Festival Performance Oct 2007.
“Avocado’s are my favourite fruit”
I am tired of trying to make the breath
Escape from these shallow thin lips
That have spent so long muttering the worth
Of those patient lines of virtue.
“I could sleep forever in this soiled safe”
I see a dozen women parading together
My own feet are barely recognized within
They include themselves amid a woman’s world
Walking amongst the sky high scrapers
Amongst their sky high shoes.
“A dreary and wasted life for a girl.”
It was the Rosenburgs that made me worry
There was a beginning of these feelings
Though I tried to loose them long before
New York took its toll offering maturity
That no one seemed to tender but would take.
“I am going for a long walk”
Conventional boredom seemed to haunt me
Hypocrisy belittled my imagination
I found that truth was a mirage against
The thundering rain of my purist notions.
“No raincoat is ever water-repellent”
I bled away some of my fierce identity so that
Against a new backdrop of home coming delights
I couldn’t bear the regime and my words
And voice became so quiet they died inside.
“You can’t coddle the sick people”
I could sleep forever in a darkened hole
I would find a slit of light and burst it
Against my ashen skin until each
Breath was taken and I found myself
Pressed between the sheets with merely
Tulips to suggest the world was spinning.
“I wonder what I thought I was burying”
————————————————————————–
Her destination would be hollow feelings tracing
Patterns inside her soul marking tracks to delicate
Destinations a lifetime did not guide her to. I could feel a breath fluttering down inside me
Emptying my mind of solid feelings until it was
Only the sunshine feeding me and only the
Echoes giving sound to each contemplation. The thin autumn wind cast emotions up with
The dreams as they swirled and caught themselves
Wishing that they were more than just a moment
Unconsciously predicted and yet never lived.
She could feel a new warmth pass through each
Ripple of water as it grazed her toes she wondered
If each King could guard her against the onset
Tenderly passing her on to the next one.
I could imagine being caught in the swirl of two
Monsters clashing together below their colours
Proudly displayed on their backs under the glare
Of that protective sunshine casting over me.
I am waving to you though I know that you can
No longer see your back is turned to me without
Animosity you are finding your feet amongst the
Royalty before you search once more for mauri.
———————————————————————–
“Deep, Breathing, Fortune”
I would let the late day sun stream
In through the glass knowing in
Moments to come the colours would
Blend together deep reds and orange
Composed as if decades had been spent
Painting the image across the skies.
In my mind I have millions of views
From high above to level and below
Amidst the bodies and solitarily alone
I’ve made this scrapbook of colours
Shades secretly stored for prosperity.
It was not just the burning reds that
Marked themselves so sharply upon me
It was the white scores across the blue
Or the grey greens that merged so
Closely with the sea that you could
Never tell where each began until
Our shivering bodies stepped into it
Delving into the colours until we ourselves
Turned into that same immersed shade.
Long before I could call you mine this
Was what I saw each morning and night
When the colours awoke and discovered
Each other like we did the bright shock
Of feelings merging into one from two
Like me and you together so the brilliance
Of sea and sky turned into one.
Each morning was a brand new climax
Contrasting colours blending together not
Like the evenings deep shocks but bright
Blues and whites and greens our national
Flag of beauty unfolding as the hours and sun
Ticked over us breathing the salt deeply in.
There are reds and oranges over a blue sea
In thousands of places and we have seen them
It is not the resolute predictability of the event
But the pure intense beauty of it there when
Your hand is in mine and we can see the angel
From the corner of our eyes guiding the sun
Finally into the deep blue ocean ahead.
——————————————————————–
Dark cloak
It envelops me as blankets
In a cold bed might envelop
A lonely body against the draft
That threatens the single foot
Slipping silently towards the
Cold hard floor like that which
I am walking against again.
It wraps me tightly like a body
Against mine under layers of
Quilt protecting delicate night time
Skins from cold dark air that
Tries to creep under sleeping souls.
It hugs closely to my huddled form
Against which there is a barrier much
Like your warmth creates under dreams
We make against the darkening skies
Together which float around me masking
The enveloping cold air though which
Tonight I alone will walk.
