a rose cheeked gardener's daughter

You have started and ended,

On your own terms.

The first pair of wavering eyes I encountered

Gave away some of the little emotion you held.

Loneliness will be your call this summer -

Sure there are the fellows of fellows

To drink your insipidness,

A huge mind for your singularity of singleness

And a tiny heart that will shrivel in time.

You still draw the looks my way,

So keen are you to pass on words of what talent

I aspire to.

Your heart is still in it, yet

Couldn’t hold anything more, against your usual customs

Of the workings of an inner mind poised with logic.

Forgive me,

I was only there to cleanse misgivings,

Forgive you,

You were unable to wash that

Woeful joy you so loved and despised.

Sirens going off in your mind

Incredulous companions shake their heads.

Tell me -

What were you fighting for,

Yours or mine?

A freedom so inconsiderate,

Were you trying to save me

From a bitter despair?

You’ve half got it already.

But it’s fading fast.

It’s short, you are not worthy

Of this writing any more.

Words –

Not enough for this little heart

That I so stupidly left out in the open

As soft as the tenderness you once gave me.

Learning to like you with heart or soul,

Learning to miss you without tears is a goal -

Take my heart, turn it softly sir, 

Not to be taken so lightly anymore.

I hope yours is a place to fit mine,

I’ve lost my innocence throughout these years.

 

I’ve been broken and I have hurt a lot,

one cracked shell inside,

A head banging and eyes brimming.

You were once as I thought you were

As honest, but not quite as worth

The paper you’re written on.

Go play, feast on the small pleasures of your mind

And forget you ever had that heart,

Not even your face can bring me to walk back.

Took a tight squeeze you did,

And dropped it, far too heavy for you.

 

 

Salty soups and fur ridden carpets

The flat an entire world of its own,

Full of distant memories,

Summoned by smells of mackintosh spice.

I have remembered you clearly,

Even when you have gone away.

Glass bowls full of forbidden sweet sensations,

That rattled revealing whenever a hand was set upon it.

Dear, dear

What have you done with yourself?

Your vodka in the fridge, our cider in the bathroom.

Always stubborn and keen to ignore

The nagging words of those younger.

All your bucketfuls of chemicals,

So close to the half bottle of brandy.

Sent you to the psychiatric ward you say,

Where you went while I was away,

And they couldn’t wash your young-looking hair.

Hair that sister and I so lovingly inherited.

We brought you the chocolates,

The chocolates you couldn’t eat, gladly.

You were and are my childhood,

Your love has set me going for miles,

The brief spells of secrets you shared with me abroad,

In that little foreign harbour town you so liked to visit.

Sweet tales of us who let the wine go to our heads.

Years before us siblings had dolls to play with,

And you had mussels to eat.

I think continually of how I’d look up to you,

What is precious I’ll never forget.

Now forever wrapped in your cable cardigan,

I have known you, all so well

And yet so little.

I wish had time to tell, you came to me in a dream

And younger than yourself you said I’m alright,

Not even a mirror image of when I saw you last.

Bitterness lasts longer than upset my friend-

It curls and eats away at

The yearning, lonely soul.

I’d rather learn to hold the upset, to cradle it in my hands.

To be loved briefly,

And to be plucked by a spindly finger

At one’s own heart strings,

Better than a lifetime of unexplained wanton.

To patch up the heart without discard

Is a thorny task.

Try to patch up the bitterness

And it creeps through your tightly held fingers like tar.

Every part of my heart hurts for you my love,

You did no wrong apart from smash this

Muscle into fragments.

Sordid act for you it seems,

Time of day will tell for me.

I wonder what you’ll be doing,

When you see me as clean

Of you, my love.

No regrets, things will work better for me, dear,

For you difficulty has its path in yours.

I live with the fact, that your kind heart

Was too abashed, too frightened

To entwine with another’s,

I could hate that month with a vengeance

And love the others with compassion.

Every shrink proof fact installed in my bleeding mind

Had it wisely proved feelings of yours were

Honestly mutual

Yet surprise brought me to running mascara.

I’ve wondered about your concern, I’ve been pondering,

True to words you were asking,

Your scared little self is too afraid,

All those years of school has shaped you.

Life held me never softly in its arms

I long for those sweet days,

Those sweet things.

Now we are alone, discard the rest,

I have a wound in my side,

But not in my heart.

Tell me those things

You couldn’t tell the others.

Nobody has to guess,

The sweet sadness I shared with you.

I’ll keep you away from the faults,

And the pensive mood.

Soon when my heart sings

I’ll dance away from

The fears-

I’ll dance for you my dear.

Too clean wards

Encase you

Hearts clenching, smells drifting

Little did we know

About you

How lonely

This place is

Mutterings and funny smells

Nursie Mc Nurse

Come to prick your finger

Senile, you say

They’re out to get you

If only I could put myself in your place

It’s not difficult to understand

If only time wasn’t against us, you

This world is a lonely place

And its pretty dull in there

So close to getting out

And breathing the fresh air

So close, away from that senile air –

Another week

Dolly mixtures, shampoo.

I can’t quite get close to crying yet

Why don’t I save it later

there’s always time for that.

Hasn’t quite sunk in yet

Slow, aching process

In the middle of the aching heart

The utter stench of grief

Lingers in that senile air.

There’s a joyous spring I haven’t met yet,

It plagues my life with infinite tenderness.

I’ve fallen, fallen hard, hard like a rock -

A smooth rock, not jagged this time.

This spring, you’ve burst into my life

Bloomed bigger than a flower could ever do

You’ve lifted me up, silly and clueless

It’s settled deep now; won’t go away for a while.

I once had the winter blues, my head clouded up like fog,

And now the smell in the air wraps its arms round me, embracing me

Captured my heart, and stored it away.

I’d like to be your necessary item, your dumb love,

Oh spring you’ve got me wrapped.

Briefly you escape away, leaving my world shrouded in a grey mist.

You squeeze my heart, perhaps if I could leave like you do,

Would I be wringing your love, if that is love?

Wringing you dry, dry like a desert.

I hope you miss me if I could escape; thing is, Spring-

I wouldn’t, even if I could. I’d love to live in you,

Curl up, close these weary eyes.

You’ll always, still, be disappearing,

I could say always, or not, surprise often arrives with you.

No more blues of the winter, please smooth it over for me,

Perhaps I should fly away, dear Spring, dear you, let loose of my inhibitions

To smile one day and burrow the next-

I can no longer look at my old reflection, for its ghouls

Melt the mirror that faces me;

Your warmth takes the pain away,

I’ve shed tears over you;

I hope one day I’ll be that important aspect in that tiring life of yours

I’ll live to love you.