i do quite a lot
for someone who’s lost the will to live

i believe in a gentle kind of love
all soft and soothing and
just right
when i am so terribly, irritatingly fragile
fingers running down my back while we lie
rib to rib, heart to heart
listening to the beat, and to the breath
and perhaps it is that, in this world of rough and tumble
of screaming and aching, to believe in a love kind and sweet is
a naivety but i find that
because of all this roaring outside our window, i much prefer
to think of that love sweet and kind
and us, tangled around each other, i think, yes

i find that i believe in a gentle sort of love

You woke in a hurry twenty years ago,
An ancient spell made you grow
Tall now, and full, till it hurts,
The earth you stand on can feel your curse

Blitzing, you play with your bad hand,
You do all that one possibly can
A golden bliss is ever near
But no pride dampens the dormant fear

So return to the olden ways
The decent home, the tempered days
Stop to reckon: you shall go on!
And drift through those spectres wailing swan songs

Now unending rhythm of swaying leaves
Calls you to find the sun in ease
Tread carefully for lying underfoot
Is the gentle vision you idly sought

The whip-through-you wind beckons season's change
A fault in the plan, the gods' yearly exchange
Early to slumber and last to wake
Dear old friend, why won't you wait?

© Copyright David Bosworth August 2023

I'm an athlete.
I can throw and catch,
and run in the sun-
all shiny and bright.
And you just sleep, sleep, sleep.

Look at me, mama.
I'm a writer.
I do poetry and stories,
all pretty and pink,
and all you do is,
sleep, sleep, sleep.

Look at me, mama.
I can dance.
I'm lonely,
I'll move to France,
meet a woman, and get married.
Look at the ants crawl through
the spilled red juice on
the grass, nature everywhere,
as you sleep, sleep, sleep. 

Look mama,
Look at me, mama!
I have children now,
all good and wise,
you're a grandma.
Why don't you wake up?

Please look at me, mama.
Open your eyes.
I'm lonely and afraid.
I'm old now, and cold,
and you still,
just
sleep, sleep, sleep...

would you love me
if you lived inside of me
because i hate it here
you’ll never see me
i used to hide
in fragments of myself
often i want to hold back
sometimes i think it’s the only way
to keep you from leaving one day

if so,
we’ll always have may

i love you,
and to prove it,
i need to end myself?
it's not  that I'm scared,
but i would die,
not knowing,
if you smiled,
when you knew,
i loved you more than myself

Of trying to commit suicide,
Of being depressed,
Help others and make them happy,
Their happiness will rub on you.
11/11/2020