My room,
Both a death camp and a safe zone,
Rather wither away,
Than face execution.

Open door,
Deep breath,
Failure.

Hand over my feelings,
back to bed,
laying there,
friends were a conspiracy.

Leaving this house a teenage floor of lava,
To the armory,
Wield headphones and an over grown coat.

Open door,
Deep breath,
Stand.

The sun hurt as if i just left a space ship,
Fear of both know and unknown,
On this planet I was the alien.

Open gate,
Deep breath,
Walk.

Pavements conveyor belts,
Pushing out ghouls of society,
Cubicle bound,
Grey walls.

Yet still asked why so scared,
Of what I wish was just in my head,
This earth,
The land of dead.

Dear Colette,
I want to write to you
about being a woman
for that is what you write to me.

I want to tell you how your face
enduring after thirty, forty, fifty. . .
hangs above my desk
like my own muse.

I want to tell you how your hands
reach out from your books
& seize my heart.

I want to tell you how your hair
electrifies my thoughts
like my own halo.

I want to tell you how your eyes
penetrate my fear
& make it melt.

I want to tell you
simply that I love you--
though you are "dead"
& I am still "alive."

Suicides & spinsters--
all our kind!

Even decorous Jane Austen
never marrying,
& Sappho leaping,
& Sylvia in the oven,
& Anna Wickham, Tsvetaeva, Sara Teasdale,
& pale Virginia floating like Ophelia,
& Emily alone, alone, alone. . . .

But you endure & marry,
go on writing,
lose a husband, gain a husband,
go on writing,
sing & tap dance
& you go on writing,
have a child & still
you go on writing,
love a woman, love a man
& go on writing.
You endure your writing
& your life.

Dear Colette,
I only want to thank you:

for your eyes ringed
with bluest paint like bruises,
for your hair gathering sparks
like brush fire,
for your hands which never willingly
let go,
for your years, your child, your lovers,
all your books. . . .

Dear Colette,
you hold me
to this life.

Sloshing round the bay road
through the foot-deep potholes,
glorying in the rain-lashed dark
as the wind made the phone-lines sing

I saw him.  Brown, dishevelled, shivering -
a leveret, bamboozled by torchlight
diminished in his dripping fur,
wild eyes wide and startled.

Trying to leap aside, he caught the fence,
rebounded, tried again,
landing this time in a muddy sheuch,
a wired brown ball of panic.

"You'll not last long in this, wee man,"
I muttered, scooping him up,
dropping him into the deep dark pocket
of my raincoat.

Home we went, where two boys waited.
I quickened my pace, eager
to be the father bearing surprises,
to widen the cast-list of this adventure.

We dried him off, the boys enchanted.
He unfolded.  He raised his head.
He bounded round the kitchen
on impossible elastic legs.

"Let's call him Charlie!" cried Robin,
and we did.  
Charlie the Hare.
Alien, crazy, impatient.

When the rain eased
and Charlie was dry,
I put him back in my pocket
for the journey round the bay.

The last I saw of him
he was bounding out of sight
indifferent to the interlude
engaged in other things.

Those wild eyes that looked beyond
had no place in a cosy kitchen
this was no pet, no human companion
there was no understanding

But every time we see a hare,
the boys say, "I wonder if that's Charlie!"
and it glows against the backdrop
of nature's unfathomable canvas.

My mind is a feeble thing
Coming unraveled at the seams
It lies to me of what it needs
Tells me to hate everything
To be so critical and obscene
Why can’t I just be happy?

I know that life is tough, and getting tougher as well.
This is why we need to rely on Strength from God.
For it shall be the thing that keeps you from giving up.
For we are made into Great Warriors fighting for God.
Not in flesh but in Spirit with his words of truth and justice.
For this world justice is not the same as Christ justice .
For we fight with Love, Gods unconditional Love here.
While this worldly warriors fight with human understanding.
With human strength but our Strength is by far greater.
Because our strength is not of this world but from God.