character piece

[old writing re-discovered]

 

but, wait-

I *know* you, don’t I?

(so I followed you with my mind)

led you into places only dreamt of, never ventured.

since I dreamt it, could only be perfect.

filled my free cells with fun facts about you,

devoured your secrets like relics

with a hungry mouth for thinking.

went down into the pit of you

& brought back up a wilder you,

splendour regurgitated,

like a bird pinned, wings sprawled

against a work-top, flustered,

busting its colours to split.

it’s no use now,

though you found a way out;

my mind has you, encased as you were,

you’ll never exceed all I dreamt you could be,

after all,

I made you, baby

unhappy nature

I’m afraid I have grown up a nothing

without knowing, I’ve fallen prey,

agreed, signed up and pledged to do right

by what the world wants

 

I’m afraid I’ll live to be nothing

and any potential is excessive trimming

to the straight and narrow

I plough through

 

I’m not sure at which point

the ambition was beat out

which moment I dwindled my goals

whether some heartbreak was the instigator

or if it’s just in my nature

to early & recent thoughts of you

you’re like a dream, you’ve always been

some fun enchanted thing, hun

your lips and teeth and scowls and tears

all pressed deep in my brain, page-marked,

starting to yellow

where I followed you to your past

& fantasised your future.

you could never make me love you less

undressed & drunk & festering

unthinkable to love you more

it’s all my brain & heart are fit for

24/4

would I

trade in gold for grey,

make a sacrifice of the captured sky

in a net of scattered clouds?

or would I hold myself as wholly still,

satisfied in the grasp of sinking grass

that a mind and pulse can’t fill?

well I might be a traitor;

nature has my heart

but the leaves are ill when we’re apart

& the sky with its sun

just welcomes in,

infinitely beckoning

& so, it’s true

without you in,

the glimmer of the world wears thin.

wants & needs

I want & need to run away

and take you with me, stay

all day in the stranglehold of

foreign sun.

or dive under duvets & dally there

all afternoon.

I want to wait no longer or

waste time here

making myself dry

with sinful misery.

 

I need you to want me fully

& only me

& need my love as a means to breathe.

grab me, complete me, throw all that to the wind

make our obligations cinders

so that we begin anew and old at once

& consummate our love non-stop

 

good old days

all it takes is a leap of faith

into wonderful guileless dim-wit fun.

all you need are your memories clean

for the parties yet to happen,

sallow-cheeked and eager, addled

all with doubts, about to dabble,

dip into hope & love and

jee, ain’t that the best?

intemerate you

I want your heart

to unravel, rewind,

go back to the start

jump in pinpricks through time

& visit intemerate you

 

& would old dates make

new you different to touch?

skin softer & flushed

with that first rush of blood

or the first gush of love

 

oh you, beautiful youth

I’m a fool for you, truly

& you’ll be my first

since the dodos, the sphinx nose,

elusive Atlantis…

(can’t tell if the water knows

how good it has it)

 

do I know, when up close

& holding you closer

& folding my arms round

the mold of you now

if it matters at all

that your past arms are absent

or wrapped round another?

too rapt to discover

the ghost of your face,

all shiny & new,

all glowing

& ruffled

intemerate you

food for thought

FIND ME; I’m not designed to work this way.

graze my mouth with a fine phrase to munch on,

I’m dining on toast

alone alone along the day

and so I shipped off to the distant land of Tesco

(al fresco, let’s go, sets glow) with a gold-white

glow of knowledge! no, it’s fading

faster than a dart to the forehead.

food for thought: ignore it.

return to life

I want to be out there madly wildly

dancing off the fucking rooftops

basking in the sun

and when the day is done I’ll dig my bed

collect the stars around me

pack in tight and live to right another day

old juan (a trifle)

there in the nude blank light
no arms to stretch right round
and tightly fret together
or slip under to a soft haze,
I fill my eyes with discernable shadows
and brave the outside sounds.
in this, the batter, howls and
scything, I am
one step closer to death.
god yes I am really alive.