Tag Archives: loss

Day 12 – the hell of easter sundays

12 ole-magnus-schei-sunnevag-untitled-76

30 years ago today, Easter Sunday 1990 (April 15 of that year), my fiancé/soulmate & I experienced the first of three miscarriages of our three and half year relationship. We were kids, both 19. 

Back then there was no internet, we didn’t know where to go get support, no easy way of knowing that we were not unique in this. But it happened twice more during the next two & half years. Each time got harder, harder to come back from. Eventually our relationship ended, in no small part due to the stresses & sadnesses of those three losses; although there were other circumstances complicating things too. 

I have never fully recovered from the loss; almost daily wonder what different paths my life would have taken had I become a father way back then. It damaged me in ways I didn’t understand for decades. It took almost 25 years to “process” the grief (even though I still feel it) but eventually my alter-ego wrote & staged a 1-woman play which got much of the pain out of me … & enabled me to find a fragile kind of peace. Naturally, I’ve written countless poems about it. & every Na/GloWriPoMo the poem on April 15 or Easter Sunday is bound to explore it in some way. That’s another little gift: the fact that it has two “anniversaries” which have only aligned once in the last 30 years.

Also helping is the fact that a once young person I taught drama to writes about her miscarriages so honestly, lovingly, & beautifully on facebook (that often trite medium). I believe her words are profoundly positive & healing for me, herself, her partner, friends & family, & no doubt many others. I also love how someone I once taught is now teaching me. Thanks, Alice, for giving me the courage to write this post so openly & reinforcing the serenity to know it’s okay on those days when coping doesn’t seem possible. 

*****

pandemic for one

this disease : infects & reinfects my mind : repeatedly : over decades : every easter : of course : but christmases too : birthdays : facebook posts : of friends celebrating : first days of school : & 21sts : & weddings : & births of grandkids : & just about anything fucking else : can set it off : a time bomb explosion : of regret : anger : what ifs : why mes : & i wonders :

there is no herd immunity : i am the herd : reinfection is frequent : sometimes more virulent : than ever before : the curve has not flattened : the only cure : a wormhole

Day 15 – sadness (always sadness today)

15 black_out_xiv___blue_candle.jpg

29 years today.

*****

home, less

the home is new
but sadness stays

my old heart yearns
for all the birthdays

that never came
.

.
BONUS POEM: April 15, 2018

Today. Every year.

*****

goldfish kisses

in the back of memory
monks monophone softly
as fish shivers pianoforte
glockenspielling my spine
these tingling goldfish kiss
past present & forever
into one molten lovechant
calcium dissolving moment
lift me up-in-to you
a been apart too long
old friend reminder

the sadness builds
I wait
           to come home

..
15b The Little House on the Mountain.jpg

Day 14 – silences (& more silences)

14 view

Familiar theme. Unfamiliar ending.

*****

Sunday afternoon farm sounds

mostly sleepy silence
a suite of breezes
  of differing thicknesses
cartwheeling leaves
bone-crunching lawn dogs
young pup’s yips
  unsure what’s going on
mad gabbing of parrots
lonely cry of a duck
  searching for the lost flock
solitary desolation
  of the only crow around

the soporific drone of man
whether high sky, dirt disturbing
or distant roadway rumbling
a forgotten radio
  playing to a shed of ghosts
the irritating digital pings
  as new words arrive
  at my mother’s phone

& my beautiful grandmother
humming made up melodies
& starting sentences
memory won’t let her finish

 

 

BONUS POEM: April 14, 2018

Bit of theme developing. Oh well, it’s part of the reason behind the trip …
NOTE: minor 2019 edits to improve flow.

*****

looking for Ambrose in the Torringtons

start in lush Merton sunshine
where we are confident one is sown
yet six of us, crisscrossing, find nothing
except freshly cut grass, lichen
& boredom blooming like mushrooms
— so five leave as one goes on
to the Torringtons three: Little —
unclear if any were ever planted here
regular — where a football pitch garden
implies looking for needles that might
not even be in this granite haystack
for not a single 18th century date’s
visible beneath time’s smoothings
whereas ironically Great — no longer
seems to exist. realise I need simply to enjoy
the moss path beneath my feet
settling sunbeams on my skin
& be reassured that if Ambrose et al
even still care, I have tried.
moments later I pass a bus full of silly
young people preparing for a wedding
which seems eminently appropriate —
reassures me I made the right choice.

14b merton.jpg

 

Day 04 – time travel (& road rules)

Orange Dwarf

Several poems started, then a last minute contender rushed in demanding to be completed with 37 minutes till midnight to go. Such is the joy of NaPoWriMo/GloPoWriMo. 

Further complications were added when my wireless keyboard batteries went flat & I had to see if any of my dozen or so randomly distributed rechargeable batteries had enough charge to fire this badboy back up. 49 combinations later, little green light was go.

*****

the speed of light

PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT:
for the foreseeable future my favourite
star is going to be 12 Ophiuchi
a main-sequence orange-red dwarf
BY Draconis-type variable star
in the east central corner
of Ophiuchus the Serpent Bearer

at around 83 percent of Sol’s mass
85 to 100 percent of its diameter
& being similarly as enriched
in elements heavier than hydrogen
as our sun it is a semi-sort kind of a twin
i guess, i don’t really know much
about the astrophysiwhatsit specs
the reason i’m interested in
this faint little blip of light
in a relatively unknown
constellation is simple

it is 31.89 light-years away

which means the light my eye
is trampolining onto the back
of my retina & zipping off up
the optic nerve to my visual cortex
left the star 31.89 years ago
which according to my (admittedly
roughly hewn calculations)

… is about 3 days before we first met

 

 

BONUS POEM: April 4, 2018

*****

Crash Course
(A Poetic Interpretation of the 12 Rules of Driving on Italian Roads)

1.
i’m just kidding of course
there’s no such list

 

30264773_1707627189326933_8928048657901399959_n_1707627189326933

Day 27 – poem about bad hair

g&g

Some days a poem just writes itself. This was one such. From a few notes jotted while I was visiting my gran in her “retirement home”, the tone quickly established itself & made me laugh out loud as the various descriptions presented themselves.

knot me

in the quiet blue of my gran’s tiny
room a photo of a long-haired kiss-
curled cow-licked feminine-faced lout;
smug in a purple-striped shirt under
neath an all-white knitted jumper
(as was, I hope, vaguely fashionable
in the Miami Vice trashed late 80’s);
set off with a heart-shaped silver bolo-
tie for fuck’s sake
                                 although i recognise
his confident cock-eyed grin, his too-
smooth clean-cut chin, & once-pride&joy
full-but-already-thinning head of fine
wavy hair, my stomach double knots
in grief & pity — for he does not yet
know all he has, nor all he will lose

Day 19 – poem about bed

19 autumn_feeling_by_bittersea CROP

NaPoWriMo continues despite a long day prepping for & running a production meeting. So the following formula: very tired + little creative juice = quick pome.

bed

you brought autumn into our bed
which was fine while the leaves

were still soft & smelt of earth
— now they crackle when i snore

& you are long gone though
i refuse to change the sheets

Day 16 – poem about serenity

Paro Taktsang – Paro Valley, Bhutan

Been partaking in much thought (as I do this time every year); as well as a Firefly marathon, so themes of home & family have been percolating round for days. (The pome itself took about an hour; finding the right picture, close to five.)

Somewhere there is a house

whether facing a storm on a cliff ;
lost in a forest ; birdhigh in a tree ;
or underground browntangled among
ancient roots ; atop an old stone tower ;
even above an ocean where mountains
once used to be, before being washed away

But somewhere there is a house ;
where when i walk in, i have always been
where i know and am known ;
where there is no need to play roles ;
no need to keep pretending all is well ;
where those long lost are as they were

i know there is a such a house, somewhere

Day 09 – poem about damage

1

If I said I understood everything I wrote, I’d be lying. Today’s effort comes from a form of poetry-generation; a pome-making game I guess. The steps are simple.

1. Make a series of lists (using prompts).
2. Choose one element from each list.
3. Find a way to combine them in one pome.

Ergo, below…

surveying the damage

through the window
yellow leaves cover the lawn
on the table bread is dark
brown like chocolate
— the wind blew all night
forcing doors & knocking
knick-knacks from sills

too cold to emerge
from beneath blankets
so the water did what it must
— spend the morning
throwing all my books
into a pulping machine
they’re useless now

 

Day 26 – Seeing Things

What with tomorrow being tomorrow, & plenty of work to do to get ready for it, today’s poem & Game are both going to be as brief as poossible. I’ll be using a variation of one of the Word Games I’ve played before, Last Line (Gone) – except this time it’s First Line (Gone; to be the last line of my poem) :).

The line is taken from  The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. A truly glorious wonderful book that made me laugh, made me cry, made me weep buckets. Told by Enzo, who is a dog, this is a book that is a delight to read & one which will no doubt linger for days.

the art of not facing the truth

it’s easy to pretend
i’m waiting for you

easy to say
i’ve learnt

easy to argue
next time will be better

easy to acknowledge
every wrong

because
now you are gone

empty gestures
are all i have

racingCROP

First line of The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. “Gestures all that I have; sometimes they must be grand in nature.”