St. Swithin's Day

She would have been twenty eight

today.

I felt some guilt at the overgrown

grave, the weeds and long grass.

Already someone else has laid a small

bouquet.

I get the tools from the car

and trim and cut in the still

summer silence.

I arrange the flowers as best I can

asking her to help me, she knows

what I’m like. I place the soft toy between

the two bouquets, hazarding at symmetry.

Only ten when we lost her.

Standing back at last the work all done

I wait for some sort of spiritual message.

Nothing.

I look for some sign in the clouds,

maybe a rustle in the trees.

Nothing.

Nothing.

On the drive back I remember

as I stood on her grave cutting

grass, pulling weeds:

“Hurry up Dad, you weigh a ton!”

and the flicking of her hair out of her

eyes, head thrown back

that cheeky mischievous grin

and realise she was with me all the time.

Selima Hill

A wonderful poet I've recently found.... Knockout and her books in the post!!!!

Her heart is like a room full of roses

that fall apart

like dry white wounds;

her heart is like a garden full of wounds

that know that pain

needs them and aches for them.

From 'Violence'

Lust.

We couldn’t hear the wailings

of the betrayed nor the calm

breathing of the innocents.

Our heads thrown back

singing to Satan - you

wide open, over the baby

grand, on the stairs,

in your shower.

Always so hungry

never satiated - I adored

the taste of you -

the smell of you.

Much later we lay

rotting in the shadow

of our guilt.

The clamour of Sundays.

Nine o’clock church

bells always come

like the seasons.

I went to Church now

and then a Baptism, a wedding

or two,

buried my child.

Once, I waited at the

Vicarage,

hoping for someone.

I might have been an

ancient druid

stomping around some

ruins marching

time.

A lifetime.

And to think one day
I’ll lie down with them.

Maybe I’ll get the news
reel thing going on

remembering.

My mam and dad,
sisters and brothers.

Us staying awake all night fucking
ourselves silly in Skeggy.

Our children-
living and dying.

Lying down at last with
the rest of them.

Thinking it didn’t last long
that -

lifetime.

Detritus

A
bin liner bag,
clothes
of a dead man,
a watch
still ticking
darned socks
grey pants a
snake belt.

I collected it-
father-
two days dead
and noticed
behind,
thirty others
bags,
all in rows
other dead
other bags.

Rain in Aberfan.

We peel the caterpillars
from Poplar trees,
gather frozen cobwebs
this frosty morn

only eight years
old the fates
already formulated
on roads of destiny.

Rain falls across
the empty playground
childless now-
a screaming silence.

Shadows of mums and dads
stall, unrecoverable,
wasting a few more hours
a few more days.