I'm just putting some poems together for my trip to the Beehive tonight....
...
then
just before we parted
in the space between the final word
just before a blackbird sang
evening rose with a sour milk moon
the countryside beyond
stood but a single broad bounded step
just before that final word
in that time
when our as yet unremembered day
trailed out to the low grassland
a shrouded whiteness fell
as cobwebs on happiness
threaded by the hope of love
that final word that breaks the glass
from which none can go back
and in which there is only parting
...
school field
in a world of false opposites
where very little has meaning
I pick at the word angst
first in the german
- then in translation
and back to the root cause
the necrotic neurons of neurosis
and dally in denial
at the prettiness of daisy chains
bitten lipped slit and threaded
and threaded by girls in summer dresses
cross legged
they show the V of their knickers
...
meeting a nazi
he was like any other nasty old man
- smug - his waistline at his breasts -
a wife skittering at his pleasure
but there was something nastier -
a certain glint in his eye - an arrogance -
glistening like the whiskers briskly shaven
'they made me build roads' he laments -
chewing on a kaiser roll - tongue lapping-
moist bread churning on his gums
'ten years they worked me like a slave -
murderers get less' - the wife interrupts him
with attempted good humour
'oh don't mind him' she says
- offering me a glass of cola -
'leave the boy alone - it's not his fault'
the half chewed bread slides down his dry throat -
before the adam's-apple has come to rest
the other half of the soup dipped roll goes into his mouth
'they were different times' continues his wife
prizing the lid from a decorated biscuit tin -
- I take gingerbread - lay it on my knee
'do you have grandparents' he asks
I sip my drink and nod at the absurd question
- how else would I be here -
for some reason this pleases him
...
you have to be fair
you forget - in those stories in which you were the hero -
how much of childhood is spent following and not leading -
how often it was you standing by the drinking fountain
watching others run laughing - in a time out
or the wasted time spent trying to be friends
with your friends - and the compromises -
that as an adult are unacceptable - because -
well just because you've got better things to do
than worry about the opinions of people who don't matter -
and you want to say - because it's the reality -
it doesn't matter - you did 127 sums on friday
and nobody has ever done more - and I'm so proud of you
but you see the sadness - and try and cuddle it out -
and remember those times when socially awkward
you ran in the perfect direction that would win the game
but tasted the unfairness of those who would not be tigged
...
father forgive me
it's in that bedtime kiss
we miss out - at our peril -
that our worth as a parent lies
or listening when we cannot
to the whirl of chatter -
and from it picking strands
of past conduct to chastise
and finding words beyond
the three simple words of love
to express that deep - deep -
expression of our hope
but none of this makes any sense
to our children grinning in our face -
waiting for the closing door
and the monsters beneath the bed
time has to pass -
for them to understand
why it is we fear the road
- hold tightly to their hand
...
peace:)
The Blue Book
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