April

Poem one of two for poetry month

April is being a pain, a thorn in my side

Something about her watery kisses makes this seem neverending

Once this ordeal is over, there’s another just beyond that hill

The urge to live like a flitting traveller is rising within me again

And what if I never stayed in anyone’s life out of fear

I’m still in their hearts, tucked up in some corner

I’m like Hope, in that jar of Pandora’s

I’ll stay there even after everything grotesque and cruel is gone

April was supposed to be something new but

It looks like I’m digging myself deeper, foot in

Mouth saying all the wrong things, cover it with my

Hands controlled by the impulses I tried to push

Down I dig like in that old story you gave me

Down to the black bath of soil I love

Down to grit that scrapes me to bits

Down past my standards

Down to Hades

And I made it to the outside without looking back at you

I have two feet on the floor again, grass curling up at me

I’m full up again, like I was on that June day of dry grass

I thought I could leave it behind but it’s there

In it’s little home behind my brows again

Waiting for someone to leave my throat unlocked

So it can spew from me in acridity and foulness unbound

Like that wasp that took you home for me

I wish I was writing to be read,

but this is another selfish pastime of mine

Inhale this and exhale it

Go about your day

Hold your head high and look me in the eye

Cradle the trust I’ve placed in you

My heart is a bowl of water

Sits in front of me as I flick matches

Smoke and sizzle, snuffed out

I can’t wait for it all to be over, for the day that

I can lie on my back in the water

scalding my eyes with the sunlight,

With you sitting back on the sand

Pretending you’re not memorising me

But then again

Only fools dream of summer in April