Some tears are too big to be held
by a flimsy little tissue.
A dabbing of nose and a clearing of eye?
Sometimes there’s a bigger issue.
Some tears need an absorbent snort:
something to hold, not judge you.
A poem for a ‘kitchen-roll’ cry
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A poem: sitting with my dying mother
At first, my tissue fills with tears.
Unable to tolerate the smell, or my fears.
The nurses so kind, so matter of fact,
while my guilt and my grief are tightly packed.
But it’s not about me. Holding on tight,
she’ll let go when her heart loses fight.
Until that time, she’s curled tight in a ball:
no control of her mind, mouth, body or soul.
And me? I sit quiet, in a meditative lull.
On life and death, this is a chance to mull.
A poem to my impatience
You seem to love my lack
of cash and space and time.
My stress gives you all the power.
My strength you tend to malign.
You love being in my car,
as I struggle to give way
to the entitled, selfish beings
you’d like me to disobey.
But how can I outwit you?
You strike from a nowhere place.
Can I forgive when in a hurry?
Or will you leave me in disgrace?
A poem for urban sunflowers
My thoughts are grey and hurried.
My heels click a pavement rhythm
that’s awfully fast and fed-up.
My true self easily gets buried
in the soil of daily hum.
I often forget to look up.
But why always so worried?
When I lift my eyes from my glum,
I see yellow and smiles erupt
with petals and hearts a flurry.
They’re the sun I yearn to become:
my game plan now feels upped.
A poem: ambivalence for my dying mother
We’ve never been close
you’ve always resented that.
So you lashed out and used
the shaming sting of your slap
to keep me in my place.
Neither too clever or too cool:
I was only ever safe
as a perfect extension of you.
So now you’re close to dying.
It’s been a rapid, vicious decline.
My resentment for your blows is
twisted round some thorny vine.
I’d love to find forgiveness,
some sense your life was worth
all those prickly punishments;
that your purpose was divine.
A poem: who owns my shadow?
While you’re that shadow under the tree
out there,
you own me.
While you’re the road rage in that car
over there,
you own me.
While you’re that person who snubbed me
back then,
you own me.
While you’re that mess in my cupboard
upstairs
you own me.
While you’re that bilious resentment
in my heart,
you own me.
While I blame everyone else
for my own faults
you own me.
But take back all that stuff
and make it my own?
Stop the blame.
Retract the same-old-same?
Well, maybe day-by-day
I will start
to own myself.
A poem about my teenage drawer
I knew where everything was in my drawer.
That’s how I could tell
when someone started rooting
for evidence I’m a Jezebel.
That someone thought they owned
my every thought, my every move.
If she didn’t choreograph it,
she’d seek only to disapprove.
I’m not the tidiest of people:
my pants mingled with my socks.
But I still had to be clever
though she thought she could outfox.
Looking back I feel rage
that I never had that safety
of a drawer to call my own.
But to challenge was controversy
so I kept a necessary quiet,
tolerated her invasive checks.
But I suspect it might’ve been envy
or a dark personality complex.
Either way, I’m through with drawers
for hiding what might be secret.
Find what you will, let your nose lead the way.
I’m not the one living with regret.
A poem about giving back responsibility
When they choose me to take from,
there’s a part of me that’s diminished.
Like sucking from a mother’s breast,
they take and take ‘til I’m finished.
I feel pulled upon, resentful. Empty
of reserves.
They feast upon my desserts,
my mains and my hors-d-oeuvre.
Although their hunger’s not mine,
an essence from me they seek,
some form of mother nurture
that in denial they sleep.
But, just like Old Mother Hubbard,
my stocks are growing bare.
Time to close the cupboard and
say no, if I dare.
A poem for a sunbathing bunny
While at rest
arms behind head,
this ultra-loved toy bunny
is a hilarious throughbred.
By night he’s a cuddly must.
By day he seems a player.
His cool little laidback stance
leaves some grown-ups nonplussed.
But the little girl who cuddles him,
hugs with joy and trust,
whether he’s catching some welcome rays
or being there with love.
A poem about the difficulty of saying ‘no’
I’m left a wreck
on the shores of my yeses.
Boundaries broken.
Advantages taken.
Waves crash through
my common senses.
All those years
trying to please,
seeming contrite
but acidic with spite.
A simpering tongue
trips on a simple ‘no’.
A ‘yes’ is a syllable dumb.
A ‘no’ is a far harder blow.
For punishment comes
with the N and the O.
Survival means faking
a shiny tableau.
inktuition 