If I lost you
I'd lose nothing

You're nowhere

Nothing
but a haunting

a flutter of chemicals in my brain
a space in my head when I realise you're already gone

Losing you...

I was a shipwreck for you
Run aground
Tattered sails hoisted high

Looking at the fair clear breeze
You said lift the anchor
Mistaking a hollow creak for a laugh

And when the woodworm finally took the mast
you cried in outrage

How dare you not sail for me
Not realising
The dry rot eroding your footing on deck

this is one of those poems
(I'm sure) you've read them before

It's about you and him
and how you were with me

and even though you're happy
and it does me good to see the pain leaving your eyes

It's about how worthless at times you made me feel (and for all the love i have for you)
it's starting to feel like a relief to be free

Yeah this is one of THOSE
poems
and I am sorry if you come across it

this is hardly a poem
(and probably shouldn't be)

But with all of this
I can't help wondering
What is wrong with me
(And the next line should be: that I put up with it so long, but is in fact still:)
That it wasn't me

If I lost you
I'd lose nothing

You're nowhere
Nothing
but a haunting
a flutter of chemicals in my brain
a space in my head when I realise you're already gone
Losing you...

but where before this jagged object, this cutting thing rending my soft parts,
has flowered now into a gentle form
floating so ephemeral
pulsing a soft joy
a gentle sadness

I can almost hold it now and let you go

Old Herne aromping in the wilds
Perchance exceeds his bound
And in a garden verdant
His hoof'ed feet were found

The careful rows of hellebore
The finely tilled red earth
The bursting bulbs of amaryllis
Enjoying their rebirth

All seemed queer to Herne the Hart
With moss and ivy twined
His ancient heart and wild blue eyes
No sense in this can find

And I realise now
There's no place for this wildness of mine
In your cultivated calm

They say there was a river feeding North Africa
the Nile’s dark twin
imagining the rolling grasslands of the Sahara
and the life therein
but all that’s left of the cloud breaks and the gentle herds
is a shadow
seen from a satellite, dark lines in the golden sand
not seen below
and I remember reaching for you

When you find the thing unlooked for
When you see what was lost before
When youre broken and you don't know if you can do it anymore

Thoughts will come
Words will come
Time
will come

I wanted you to say
Stay
I wanted you to say
Stay
I wanted you to say
Be here with me

But fear is the leopard in the darkness

en ná die storm se kalm
en ná die wind en reën
is die sagtheid van die aarde oorverdowend

my blinde oë
en krom ou hart
lê soos sade en
vrôt in die land

tot onder sterlig een aand
dié muwwe vlies bars
en 'n fyn wit worteltjie
voel-voel die wêreld in kruip

*

and after the storm's calm
and after the wind and rain
the softness of the earth is
deafening

my blind eyes
and crooked old heart
lay like seeds and
rot in the land

'til under the starlight one night
this mouldy membrane burst
and a fine white root
tentatively creeps into the world

While you're in love with the light
I turn my back to the sun
I look into the void
I see the stars revolve
I see me look back in return

I turn my back to the sun
I see you out there hiding
A brave face for a ghost

You're a shipwreck tossed about
You're a mountain standing proud
A man a god a child a school of silvery fish

You're in the river and in the Master of the flow
But I am a child of the Tides
And under the power of that siren call

I'm confident in my vision
You can't know what I've seen
But I'm where I need to be

And I do it for me

All these ******* sentimental retchings
every generic emotional spasm
recorded for posterity
displaying my fragility

and hope for strength and endurance.
To be understood

Perhaps, try to live a better life

In the safety of your strength
In this bubble of us
We're OK

I can see a new world dawn
Feeling for the first time
beyond

the falseness cast upon me
The totality of
My truth

And in this consuming flame
The brutality of
my loss

Shattering all in its wake
and now I float away
from you

clinging
to hope

Idk what to say
So i make a noise
It is a bridge between us

But you’re a floating island
And I'm solid granite

Would that i were like you

From under the rock, a pool appeared
A mirror glass between me and you

He rolled the crushing weight away
And in that sapphire space I recognised you in me

But at the height of our freedom He stumbled

Tumbling, falling for you and the impact
Final

And my heart leapt when he saw you
And yet he faltered as he flew
Seeing the end in all things, loneliness
and the despair he well knew

Leaf strewn steps' descent into darkness
Banks of fog churning the depths
half-caught of floodlight in the park

Rolling towards me
cold like you
But advancing

Seeking my company, such as it is

If there could be an honest moment between us

The sun  would lose its orbit
The moon crash into the sea  

But the foam from the storm would blow ashore
Shrouding everything in white brilliance

This is an estate of loss.
Every new thing entered in its ledger,
Measured against and lined up

        All these faces remind of yours
before


          I know you're OK now.        
          I know it was long ago
          I know you don't think of it anymore and I'm glad

But it's a spectre I see everyday in the palms of my hands

It's taken me some time to be happy for you
To curdle you from me  

But now it's done I'm happy for me too

               Just so you know I'm still the same; I offer you a sign

My heart degenerates into a dark storm
Nought left of that calm warm horizon or your bright sun
No up, no down nor the silence of form        
Unbound savagery bleeds from my skin

Would that I could
gather space about me
engender love from emptiness  
And attain your broad shape out from the darkness

A storm subsides
And lightning ceases to flash

The shuffling shoulders disappear
And the sweaty hides dry

The darkling eyes close
And the panting breath deepens

The groan and come sink into silence
And I'm stripped of pride and shame

Naked, ***** and untouched
No word reaches me

Eyes ablaze
Body carved in marble
                                                        
But still
From somewhere
A fragment of you remains  

Frankincense in the night

and when everything's stripped back
And all self imposing things are gone
What's left?

A fury of wings folded
A silence suddenly fell

And in the bright dark
A crown of crows