I. missing poster, Kensington High Street
at what point did i vanish?
i did not evaporate.
i am still a collection of matter.
of energy, essence and intangible spirit.
it is from others, i have vanished.
it is to them i am lost, intangible,
the off-screen character,
the plot point in many a story too unremarkable to be seen.
my face lies plastered across walls in the borough
in various states of life.
but i am not here,
i do not stare state portrait shallow into you,
for i do not know you.
don’t think it couldn’t be you,
or do,
and prepare to exist,
sans living.
but you may ask “where?”
“where” may not exist.
it has no post code, no roman underlayer of brick.
no parisian layer of skull,
that is not where i lay.
if i lay.
“where” may not allow me my harsh whispers,
my last finger upon the cliff
“where” may call to me
from its halcyon planes.
come home.
II. The Dell, Kensington Gardens
what better a place to vanish from,
to trace my path from,
or what it will allow.
let my scent linger?
god may allow it.
i’m told the gardens’ gates are closed
promptly at dusk each day.
there are no street lamps here.
to be locked in after sunset is something other.
something indigo and sublime,
too early in the year yet for crickets.
it was this blanket i knew last before departure.
and yet even during the day, The Dell is sealed off from the public, like vast wings of a stately home.
it is pristine, this vanishing point.
seemingly untouched by the sickness of our humanity.
its miniature waterfall bisecting the scape
like the crack in our god’s head that birthed athena.
i don’t think it will ever be revealed to me,
my loved ones or god himself if i have chosen this place
or if it chose me.
III. The Dell, continued.**
the gardens that day were trapped in the faintest, yet most distinct bubble of brisk english detachment.
i walked, hand in pocket through its paths,
admiring Victoria’s memorial to her beloved,
thinking how we always view her as this austere widow.
but we forget that she too, once loved and loved so deeply.
that it so moved her, and changed her.
we forget that the divine can also be wounded, albeit not lethally, but with subtle, lingering pangs.
it was this thought that fueled my feet towards the Dell,
with its rolling, sample-sized hill,
its ageless trees with their hooked branches
in various un-regal poses.
i must have stood in admiration for five, twelve minutes before it dawned on me with the most pristine clarity:
i need to be a part of this place,
forever bound to it.
a statue in its gallery.
this is where the trees have come from.
they are the shells of former lovers,
rooted in the deep, richness of the Dell’s soil.
we bend and undulate through centuries,
we are the dancers forever spinning,
never to rest,
for whom would want to?
