Battered bookworms
turning a familiar turn
(always left)

For those that leave:
your threads become part of the tapestry,

a picture writ with deep love, excitement, applause,
dire fears and tiredness,

here be dragons and arrows in eyes

but despite the hamfists
of some intrusive hands,

there to see forever

Better than ****** Christmas
this six weeks that we continually justify
that stop our hands breaking,
the dying of hearts and minds

though in the middle
somewhere
when we regain our human form
sometimes storms rage a bit
and we stand, clifftop howling
at an unknown moon

on return we’ll have lost friends, loves,
yet be reborn to care, to teach,
to take the slings and arrows again
from this pauper’s fortune

Oh, my tired sisters and brothers
I know.
Each and every step and gesture
has hidden lead weights attached
and everything lifted now hurts

You are allowed the involuntary grunt
or voluntary tear as you stand,
all eyes and ears are itchy with
tired

There is still a smile allowed
as long as we keep an end in sight

your name
is still on my door’s
nameplate.
next to mine.

i haven’t had
the strength to
change it.

you know how much
i hate doing
mundane things:
cooking dinner,
washing dishes,
folding clothes.

but sometimes,
you just need to do it;
you know…
the work.

Before, I couldn’t see you
I would write about your eyes
Your smile
Your hair
All cliche, all flat
I couldn’t write
How I tried
Now I see you...

I see a green mantis
I see your freckled patina in that photo with the perfect light
I see you engaging the waiter in conversation
I see your long limbs loosely crossed
Cradling your herbal tea and segmenting your orange
I see you

The soft nape of your neck is in my dreams

I see you swimming ahead in the river,
I see your joy in that, and remember me needing to turn back
I see us crouched on the railway sleeper,
The last of the sun crossing us
While the washing up waits
The beer dries on our lips
We sit looking back at your home

I see the young and sexless person you told me about
Your nose in a book on the family holiday

I see the flicker of self-doubt
the slow rising tear that doesn’t spill over
being all things,
mother, worker, friend, lover

I see all the things you are not
that I projected onto you
Now I see you

if i do not tend to my wounds they will become infected
inflamed, red, hot to the touch
rotting and dripping with pus

i know this, and still i let them fester
refusing to remove the soiled bandages because i know it will hurt
even though i am no stranger to pain

eventually the sickness will infect my blood
spread to the rest of my body and brain
maybe it will **** me
but i will not hold my breath

i have survived wounds like this before
i have the scars to prove it
i have no choice but to heal
and try again

i keep thinking that if i cut away enough layers of skin
i will reveal the one that has you hidden underneath and
scrub you out

it is a foolish notion
a false ambition
but one that i cannot seem to shake
one that, like you, i have been unable to sear
from my mind and from my heart

i am told that in time you will pass
but it takes seven years to shed my skin
and you have burrowed deep

i do not have that kind of time, i fear
and the longer you stay here
the deeper my discomfort

I’m fighting the urge to talk to you.
I keep typing out the message and erasing it at the last minute.
Hoping that if I keep doing that you might text first.

But you won’t.
Neither of us will.

It’s been settled now,
It’s all over

We said goodbye to each other on that late night drive last year,
Call it our own little leaving party.

We both live in the same area but will never talk again.

And that’s okay
It’s safer that way

For me at least

But sometimes,
I miss having someone to talk to.

I wish I could talk to you.
I want to tell you about the books I’ve been reading and the places I’ve visited that I know you’d love.

But I can’t.
And that’s okay.

I miss having you to talk to.

- Leah