Little One

Little One, wilted, you were, weren't you?
And if you are a little bit honest
with yourself, you'll see
that you still are.

Yes, Little One, you've come so very far
but not even close to the
place you need to be. Demolish that frown.

Settle down and you may be okay.
Try to be fine, love.
Try to function.
That junction you are stuck at;
just drive across it like a mad woman.
Just go. Overthrow your fears and cares.

Threadbare, you're off on a journey, Little One.
You can do it;
I'm your star in the sky; I say you'll get through it.
Pick up your life, gather those rags,
the shards, the tiny pieces
that once comprised a day in the future.
Patch them back together, stitch them up with magic thread
and make a different kind of life instead.

One without me, a year less one season.
For some funny little reason, love,
you won't be able to think about summer
any more without thinking of me.
I'm sorry that has to be how it has to be.

You never liked it anyway, Little One.
You fainted in the heat; you couldn't cope,
but I hope you're able to now.
You know I would never allow this incredible moping.
Pull yourself together, Little One.
The things you regret are now already done.
You can't change the facts.
I know in your mind you want so much more
but we can't arrange any of that, any of this.

You miss me, my love.
I miss you as well and I want to tell you
that your life was a spark of my undying fire.
And if I were here now, I would
try to inspire some spark in you now.

Just make me this little vow, Little One.
Love me forever, but please don't dwell.
I know you're going through a unique kind of hell
but that's enough of all this.
Don't dismiss the life you have made.
Don't let my spark in the fire shudder and fade.

Little One, step out of this shade.
In a day, or more than a day, or many more days,
you will find a place.
Remember I waved a little flower in front of your face
to make you smile, wearing pink.
And when you think you're alone,
remember, love:
give yourself a bloody shove. Get back
outside and into the light.
I never taught you to give up on a fight.

And when that night closes in and
attacks.
Know that, while I can never come back,
I never even went at all.
I'm in your pictures on the wall and in your
hands and in the golden threads of your hair.
You're wrong when you say I'm not there, Little One.
I'm not done.
I'm still here. I'm around: it's true.
I'm your mum, Little One, and I'm still sat here, right next to you.

Lifesaver

He jumped in without thinking,
and a life was saved.
He's never been called "brave" but he is.
Walks everywhere,
A full head of hair,
Cuts his meat with a fork.
And he rescued me with a projector.

Yorkshire men are quiet,
of few words and fewer embraces
but when he burrowed beneath our
house and fathomed a fiver
from my ear, I didn't
even know about fear then.

His mother, father, brother
now daughter
the thought of his strong strong heart
persisting though,
keep on walking,
he has taught me about love.

A walking metaphor,
he told me that the reason for
his slap-dashery
was so she didn't slip back
under the net again. And in fact,
he is that river he leapt into.

Half-Whole

I brought you back with all the Christmas presents,
and I intended for it to be
an interruption to me and my routine
but you've sat and accompanied me
through my life, lately.

You do the dishes, pack the bins
and take them out.
You and I have nothing, any longer,
to argue about.

I have never felt more pride. Pride has battered
my care for threads and dust.
In the pale gray light of day, it's still us.
My brother, your sister,
Of course we cling on because we both miss her.

Love infintismal. Call and I'll
listen to you. Always. 

When you went away
to interview for your future, I was scared
you'd bolted.
Tears revolted
from the eyes that have seen you on the sofa
like a well-timed cup of tea.
You - without knowing - have comforted me.

He's a strong, slumbering, generous soul.
He's my brother. The only half that fits my .one half of a whole.

Yellow and Green

I saw you last night.

You wore faded green, an oversized jacket. And you came through

the door of my childhood home as if back from the shops.

I leapt on you. As if I knew, in my sleep, it might

be the last time.

And this was the first time I’ve felt happy in such a long time.  

Golden and feather-soft, your hair against my cheek.

I didn’t feel like crying, but to speak?

That might ruin it.

You looked at me, laughed and said something like “I know, love. I died.”

Such a ridiculous joke,

we chuckled together inside my faraway mind.

Like we were looking back on an old feud, or chatting about

a petty friend. We were above this. It didn’t have us nailed.

Suddenly co-conspirators in the grand mischief and trespass we were doing –

We had stepped over the real-life line to deride silly death.

Fooling everyone!

You lifted me -- this woman-girl -- like a baby.

When you barged through the threshold, the green wooden door,

you barged your clumsy way back to me; the way you used to be.

Not that body, or long absence, or those heavy heavy ashes.

This was not the greying memory of

my mother who thrashed out of my life too soon.

You wore green and the light through the window

meant a late summer evening. I smelled the hose pipe and heard the footsteps on the gravel.

Us in the midst of some glittering dust.

Just the two of us.

 Pale yellow and green;

Those were the pastel shades of my dream.

The Soldier

Keep soldiering on.
Like you've done all your life,
Since you went away and had all those adventures,
you took yourself and her beyond beaches, beyond trenches,
Beyond life: we have it.
You commandeered a life of ours,
steered and sailed into the harbour,
set down a diamond anchor.
I can never properly thank you,
for the life you gave her.

The love you had; the songs you sang,
Must have drowned out the bang, bang bang
in your ears.
Over the years, you wound around
and never made a single sound about the
stamps of feet underneath or above that have taken
your little love and mine.
We won't be fine but at least
we have your strength and your skill
your incredible strong will.
you've had your fill
and until
you feel like you can take no more

I can offer you something, an overture.
I can do her voice, and can conjure her up.

Diamonds and silver and resin and ashes.
Bodily things that we can't feel.
My love for you is an atom bomb of real.
You're a strength.
So we've gone AWOL for a while, but like a true soldier
you'll emerge and soldier on.
Even though the thing you're fighting for is gone,
continue, find a new one: me maybe?

Everyone needs a soldier to protect them.
Everyone accepts help if they need it.
Everyone is an empty flag awaiting an emblem,
A soldier who wishes it was only war he has to revisit.

P.E.K.

He was the man of the family,
forecd, he didn't want to be but he stood up.
A scrappy, curly haired boy who - instead of toys - had
courage.
He hated his father.
Because he didn't know the meaning until
he was one.
His sharp edges, and cellophane words meant he never heard
my cheers on the sideline.
He never knew how proud I was that he was mine.
Fleshy, but retract. If he saw me react,
it was hidden. Two times I saw him
cry.
My dog and his mother, things in him died
those days. Loyalty, responsibility, and love.
He was was like a strong thing that had been given a shove.

And then she went, was gone.
When she went. He strode up towards me,
the hero, the pick-me-up, the Dad I'd needed,
he went on a journey himself, he had to pull
down things that were on a shelf,
picked up stones,
ensured that his children were not alone.
When he walked up that lane
in his leather jacket, arms outsretrched,
I still can't thank him yet. For being my
hero, my Dad, my rock.
If we only have one left, I'm glad it's you, we've got.

Page 3

It's easy to
get change from a pound for a paper.
A pair of tits.
"But if she didn't want to do it she wouldn't"
"She makes loads of money."
"Strippers are canny."
"Come on, love, show us your fanny."
You've paid some money, and you deserve a product.
Let's not be reductive,
she looked seductive so it's - of course - alright.
At a certain time of night you have to expect
to deal with a knob: it's a pretty well paid job.
Like banking...except you won't have
a twat in your glass office visibly wanking.
We've got it better than ever before,
so these "feminists" should stop moaning,
drown out their shrieks with falsified groaning
and shaven havens. Splayed legs.
Let her go to the toilet and mop up your dregs
and you go home for the evening.
Believing it's normal, a stag night tradition.
A screwed up banknote equates to permission,
consent.
It was never your intent but you took it.
Fuck it, it's easy, it's across the counter
like buying a packet of fags,
and aren't they all just slags anyway?
Your missus would never do that,
wave her arse in the face of a gurning twat just for money.
Funny. Isn't it?