I wander
those waning years sometimes still seeking sanctuary weak of will from the woes
of this week from the traps of my today looking for comfort in my misremembered
moments of a yesterday years ago now my hopes sewn like seeds invisible into
the sands of that time all those trips all those breaks all those tissues all
those peanuted ties all those plaid skirts that split in the summer and showed
slivers of thighs slights we found so tantric accidental flashes that drove us
manic; all those shirts we’d swear were half buttoned gullible gluttons gawping at
something that was never there to stare at beyond the optimistic ogles of our mutual mind’s eye; all
those tattered catholic crests sloping over our puffed out chests and their unimpressed
and resting breasts; all those little molehills made by us into mountains that
haven’t stood the test of time untainted; all those forbidden and always bitter
beers that we swore blind were just what the day called for through our wincing
on a winter-worn wall in November rain red brick straining against the grainy
green of ever-growing moss in Whetstone near our school near my home as we made
fun of everything we saw our eyes glazed and glassy after half
a can our smiles wide our laughs loud our words blue and booming blooming
nothing we meant really ever all of us 16 and never feeling fresher; all of us full of spirit all
through the evening feeling splendid for the night fighting flirting hurting no
one really just being just seeing the sights just trying to be at the right
place at the right time with all the wrong girls who made us curl in our
chairs and miss our stops because we couldn’t stop staring at them on those journeys
home; the girls that kept us awake when we were all alone who we’d hope would
invite us in like sirens singing and searching for ships and sea men; girls to
share our sighs to bare their skin to us and bear with us through our muffled
and misguided meanders their hands steering ours clear of our pre-mature
mistakes letting us learn on their shifting curves constantly the girls steading our
hands through the nervous shakes all those apologies all those scraped knees
all those unrealised opportunities to walk them to their door afterwards all
those glimpses all those glances over shoulders during snogs as we took chances
at the gates between classes between sets homeless for the night to dodge our
parents’ sight with all the saints to our side and a disappointing metal band
strumming away inside in the dim in the dark under unlit street lamps in each
other in memory now all this hides ground glass among grains of scorched sand
and who we were resides with it all my fears; all those moments we felt were so
timeless, aged and caged in those wandering years that we walked away from
towards a future full of fears that my tears cannot turn away:
The degree
to the dole to the sink hole of suburban decay to a depleting O-Zone and a
diminishing ability to finish breaths without wheezing and that queasy feeling
when I’m reeling with the wrong person at the end a room away from a
subterranean tomb my teeth stained my mind feigned fractured waiting to see if
rapture reaps me looking through my life for something to keep me in my body in
my bed and finding only echoes of being 16 in my head until my mind’s gone and
my mouth moves through the motions to maintain a movie refrain my dying words a
nonsense quote barely heard by the nurse who doesn’t remember my name without
the chart she so artfully checks every time she sees me; the name of a sled I
never owned.
A lie
to mask the ones I say are true the ones where there was
actually a you to address the ones where you were actually there in that bus by
my side or in my sight or staring with me 'stylishly' stoic in our black blazers
or not caring to look back in your simple summer dress. I confess to all: none of you
were ever there to address or to caress but I couldn’t take the empty so I placed
you there to deter the distress I felt.
It doesn’t
matter now anyway, because I’m alone in a bed with a place for a pan and time spans
behind instead of ahead today; panic sounds panels come down shocks shock ticks
tock my chest rises and drops my toes curl my teeth clench my head swirls and I
see the ceiling and I feel the healing and I feel the heart beating the heat
back into my fingers as the life I wish I hadn’t led this way lingers leaving
me here with a leer the taste of today as bitter as those beers but worse but
real; the room clears of the underpaid double shift leaving me alone again as
they always do to sift through this terrible present but I can’t anymore so I
press a button, feel morphine pump through my collapsoing core, and I wander
back to the wonder years that never were, thumb to the button, never for the
truth to occur again.
