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Ingrid Murphy Jul 2019
I know how it feels now
- Home

Hens pecking
sunlit earth
lazy shadows on familiar journeys
I know those hens
I know those walls
I know how slow Time can be
when shadows and light linger together
in smooth, warm stone

I know how Home feels before it is gone
before all this was undone
the ripping apart
the tearing asunder
the plunder
the going under
I know places where Home is not.

I know cold walls
unlit by shadow,
defiled by iron,
umbilical chains I cannot escape
the Others fading
the absence of hope
I know what it is to know they'll be shot
whilst I will be spared
because my body is young
and strong
I know what it is to be granted life
so as to work
for those I abhor, despise, detest
I know what it is to be breaking stones
to be breaking bones
for Them.
I know it can not be endured
I know.
And yet it is so.

Surprise me, you say
What next?

There is more.
I know what it is to be Not yet Done,
not even begun.

The strange misty calm of peace in a field
slowly descending as I know I lie dying
The ragged, fist-size hole in my chest
unexpectedly large (“where is my heart?”)
snagging,
stopping me
catching the wind
clutching my mind
bringing me back
I repel
I resist
I reject
I rebuff
I shall never be taken
I will never give in
I will not let go
I have not yet finished
I've not even begun
Rigor mortis is killing me, gripping me, stopping me breathing
I am suspended forever in my own dying clutches
Every fibre refusing to resign to Love
refusing to return to those above
My work is not done
not yet.

I shall never abandon what happened here
in this field and in all the others.
It shall not be forgotten
I shall never resign
I will not let this pass.

I know too the gentle roar of 'No More'
The rising tide, the tiger's wave
gathering pace, gathering force
lapping the feet of evil.
One by one they all dissolve
drawn down - drawn up - by the surging waters
There is only one wave
There is only one ocean
roll on wave
roll on
roll on

I know the tug of waterlogged oars
and a raft that outlived its purpose.
I know the place where hens peck the earth,
where shadow, sunshine and stone are as one
An alchemical blending of rage and peace
I know dancing columns of a thousand flies
a thousand miles high
lit up by the sun
I know how it feels
When it's done.
Ingrid Murphy Jul 2019
It's in your eyes again:
Fear
O Betrayal
You fear me.
I am too much.
Too strong, too deep, too wild for a child
For a feral child has to be wild
It's cold, there's a harsh wind blowing
and nothing to eat
but what you fight for.

Yes
This is what I am
what I had to become.
You made me.

Make no mistake: I'm proud
Domesticity no longer draws me
I know what to fight for and how.
So the look of fear in one who should hold me so dear
makes it all come true
I will annihilate you.
Die, you nobody, for you made this happen
Die, weakling
Die
Ingrid Murphy Jul 2019
I lost my land
a beautiful land it was
how the earth smells after rainfall
the ants in the forest

I lost my land
a beautiful land it was
trails of phosphoresence in the dark velvet sea
still bear the imprint of me

I lost my land
a beautiful land it was
I cannot name it
its sounds are too soft for here

I lost my land
I keep it in my head
in a place named secret
I keep it in the pockets of my heart
the left hand deepest part
I keep it in my eyeballs
always

I lost my land
a beautiful land it was
I was my land
my land was me

I lost my land - but then I found it
they kept it all this time in the lost and found
they kept in the borderlands
in cold town
they kept it with a view to both the old and the new
they kept it with such care

I lost my land - and then I found it
I found it down an avenue framed in autumn gold
amongst the hills of old
I found it safely homed
I found it on the landing
between two people
between two worlds
Ingrid Murphy Jul 2019
I was with child
I am still with child twentyone years on
But I worry so
I worry for you

I fear the world
My worry is as big and dark as the moon
    ( darker
        bigger )
What might this world do to you?
what will I possibly do if it does?
I am still with child
I have not the words
for something as dear as you are to me
    ( Please keep safe
         please keep safe )

But - strange circumstance -
last night I saw
you are in the world too
A world all at once so much less menacing
You and World
have somehow become one
And home is where the heart is

My little white dog stops worrying his bone
Looks up
Carries the bone to the old old tree
buries it by the roots
His bone is safe now
white and free

He will return
It is a snug place there
warm earth
warm bone
warm world
with you in it
Ingrid Murphy Jul 2019
Do not say a word. Do not explain
Do not make it better.
Do not apologise
Do not voice a sound.

Just write down what you did.
just write

You will write and I will scream
You will write while I scream
You will do as I say
You will just write.
I will provide the soundtrack.

I will scream
just scream
until I’m unable to scream any longer

Then I will be quiet and you can rest.

Then I will scream again
I will just scream
till I can no more
Then I will be quiet

Then I will scream
and so it will go on
That is how it will be.

You will not leave
You will not move
You will NOT touch me.
You will not say a word

I will scream and you will sit
You will not turn away
You will not move
You will not sleep
You will stay
There.
You will not leave.

This is my scream.
It is all that is left of me.

Hear it.

— The End —