The Poetry Marathon

He had made it “specially”

With a sponge robin on the side.

Bright with crimson feathers

and two manic googly eyes.

The roof was newly tiled with tiny squares,

all stuck on firm.

A coloured cross of sequins decorated

the round door

And the marker scrawled upon the front

Said

“I love you Mum, I’m Rare!”

If you need anything just ask.

When should I ask?

Not now.

Not that.

Only if you need what I think you need.

But you know you can always ask.

I sat smoking and staring and blethering to myself while all that needed done was undone.

I can feel them again after two years under scabs.

They get hard again sometimes,

but not yet in delight,

they used to only subside when I was hot in the bath.

When the skin students poked at me and talked to each other, without addressing me, about how terribly sore they must be and how it was a shame they wouldn’t heal.

I thought, fuck you, but my neurons wouldn’t carry it to my mouth for me then

They had no ideas to help.

Module Fail.

I thought, fuck you, again.

Uselessness.

The whiteheads and pus are gone.

They no longer bleed or boil up.

And they look great after all my oiling and rubbing.

Fuck you, module failures.

Ruminating

Cogitating

Thinking of betrayal.

Agitating

Analysing

Whys, wherefores and whats.

Picking at it

Worrying it

Wondering how if

You could only just forget,

The stings

The pain

The rainy past

And then

Reinvent a brand new

Story

Germinate

And feed it good

You’d extract the honey from

This hive mind

And not feel quite so sick.

I saw clearer

in the fog, from a fettered brain,

the height of it.

The length of your depth.

The flatland of your thought

and all your angles laid bare.

My diminished bank account confirmed it.

The shock on his tiny little face

As a deathly hideous ghoul was put forward

As his mother will never leave.

I rage now again that the mirror wasn’t brought, the make up wasn’t bought and no one thought to think while my mind was mired in morphine.

I heard in those words

the blame fall on me

for his reckless behaviour

while I couldn’t breathe

Your snipy remark,

made in a temper so whipped,

made it clear to me then

He’d been building strong sticks

for the blame to fall either

In your house or mine.

My heart broke again

In that moment I realised

He had lied to us both.

For years, oh God, it was years,

to see who’ d serve him most.