Conversations
Conversations is a long poem, that's why it has it's own page...
should have been me
instead of beautiful you
who was the one
that went to fetch the shopping
and who the poor driver didn’t see
crossing
there, where
we always crossed to miss
the traffic: not at the end
by the corner, but in the space
in the middle, because I
always said that it
was the space that got lost
amongst the madness of every-
day existence. Now that space is hidden in my mind
safe from the smiles
and love
I used to know.
I picked up your photo tonight I
don’t know why, I guess I just wanted to see
your face again,
and remember your smile;
it’s been a while and I’ve missed you.
I picked up your photo holding it
like some delicate, fragile, precious thing
in my hand, unlocking your image from my mind:
envisaging your presence watching over me
inwardly laughing, and for a moment it’s like you’d never gone.
But the epiphany has to end
and you merge into the surrounding space
as I realise that I have lost
you again, and I’ll keep losing you now
as much as I miss
your love
and the time we were
together.
And as the tears begin to wash over my smile
of your memory, you come flooding back to me
like a magnificent tidal wave of the mind –
externally exploding and encompassing everything
that I am, and that was you;
and I can only pray you aren’t gone –
that the space
you filled can be forever
complete with you, and now,
I want you to know I still love
you.
Taking a tissue from the box sitting on the table next to where
I’m lying, I wipe my eyes
and the times you used to caress my salt drops and kiss
away my pain and mend
my fear flash through my brain – memories unlost
like the grainy black and white films we used to see.
The phone rings. I so want it to be you again
on the other end of the line, like it
was in the days when we had to be apart and all my waking
hours I’d be anticipating
your call – I’d be walking the streets of wherever
I was staying thinking of your smile
unwittingly lost
in my thoughts of what you were
doing, hoping you were equally lost in your thoughts of me,
wishing the time away until I
would be hearing your voice say I love you’
and picturing you in my mind.
And the calls we shared are missed
almost as much as the love,
almost as much as the sea
of what is gone,
because it had to end
of course, and now
I’m left here, alone in the circle of space
we created, and I hate it.
The phone stops ringing
because I know it’s not you. How can it be? Whoever
heard of a call from heaven? That’s where you are isn’t it?
Gone but not forgotten to the abyss of paradise. An eternity that doesn’t include me
while I suffer a life time of hell miss-
ing you.
I sit here, wondering where
you are now
wondering what has happened to the love
that’s lost…
is there a heaven?
Or are you end-
lessly floating, carrying the smile,
reading the mind
where no-one
can see
where the eye
can’t reach, in the space
between forever
and me.
I’m standing up now, I’m
telling you just in
case you’re only allowed to hear me, not see
me, oh I’d give anything, to recapture the love,
for one glimpse of your smile,
one fragment of your vocal-wave, one finger tracing over my breast, the end
of a breath of the past, or one taste of what we
used to have.
I’m standing up now, pouring a chaser,
a forty-five percent proof triple; it eases the grief you know,
well, numbs it I suppose is the correct term, you’d be proud at my attempts – lost
admittedly, too late to please you now you’re gone –
to think about what I’m saying, to articulate myself in the proper diction, to rehearse it through in my mind
and to be careful what I say, as they are careful not to mention you,
careful to avoid talking about it.
Like it’s something you can just dismiss.
May be it’s better for you
not to see me
may be it’s better for your love
just to be listening to these voices that haunt my mind
day after day, nightmare after nightmare. I
haven’t been taking care of myself, unable to ever
give a damn now there’s no-one to impress, you certainly wouldn’t be
proud to this end:
Silence …
I down what’s left in my glass, everything’s
become so blurred I’m not even sure what it is now;
her mum phoned yesterday, wanted to say ‘hi’, see
if I was doing all right and stuff and say, also, we all miss
her. Haven’t seen them since – since the funeral as it
goes. They want to come over, can you picture them trying to smile:
her mum found a box of her things lost
from when she once
moved out and thought I might like first choice.
I couldn’t tell them that being near anything where
you’ve been is unbearable and I can’t even face opening
your study door.
Her mum sounded like she needs to see
people, leave the house, get used to continuing her life now.
Who am I to give advice on the grief process, love lost?
I pick up your photo in my careless hand, from its
resting place behind
the urn on the mantle. I stroke your face like I
used to stroke you when you would lie next to me,
naked, grinning that irresistible smile
that could make my heart flutter no end
no matter how tired I was or how mad at you.
I closed my eyes, my fingers brushing
back your hair out of your face, and ran them down your cheek to your lips where
you took each one
with your tongue and kissed
them to send a shiver down my spine…
a shiver down my spine that brings me back to a conscious space
and a recollection that you can’t ever
again love
me.
I wish I could be certain of your hearing these words in my mind,
that they aren’t simply a futile attempt to lose
some of the guilt or grief; that you know
I haven’t forgotten the love we shared, the love
I share only with myself in these moments of reliving
the heartbreak, of recapturing
the instant my soul deflated into $the meagre shroud it
has become, the love that encompassed me through knowing you,
for existing in your existence, the love that remains, despite you not. I
want you to know how much you meant to me…
mean to me…
that every second I find something new to miss,
something new that should make me smile,
but instead only reminds me of what I can’t ever
replace.
Dear You,
I want this pain to end:
I want the hurt to be gone;
I want to be able to open the door and see
you hovering where
you used to stand on the porch, when you
forgot your key.
But all that thought is in
some kind of vain,
and the memory I want to hold onto becomes lost
among that anger, fear, and hatred I
feel, the happy smile
I used to wear,
the special one
we used to share, is only a part of the mind –
the vast space
full of the already lost recollections that I fear my love
for you will end
up in; except I know
that you’ll never
leave the haunted conscious that I have become.
It’s like I’ve forgotten how to see
beyond the mis-
take I made that day when it
happened
should have been me
instead of beautiful you
who was the one
that went to fetch the shopping
and who the poor driver didn’t see
crossing
there, where
we always crossed to miss
the traffic: not at the end
by the corner, but in the space
in the middle, because I
always said that it
was the space that got lost
amongst the madness of every-
day existence. Now that space is hidden in my mind
safe from the smiles
and love
I used to know.
Safe from the smiles
and love
I used to know
I’ve become a hermit, lost
in myself, a far cry from the me
that was alive with you
a far cry from the all-singing
all-dancing
out-of-our minds
non-stopping never-
ending
party we were
so lucky to have experienced, the one
I dreamed of having when I
was young, the one I’ve already practised missing
so many times, the one I know I can’t replace
but that’s okay, you know, it
will remain perfect, ice
perfect, preserved like you
in the urn on the mantle place.
I’m lying down now
I’m telling you that just in
case you can’t see
me.
Remember when I
used to lie here and you would sing to me?
I am singing my love
to you, the harmonies floating in
and out of my lulled mind
your smile :)
circumferencing the words you would surrender
and my problems became lost
in the never-never
land of us. How I used to deliberately mis-
read your innocent ramblings and turn every one
to…well no need to go into it
in detail is there? We’re
a thing of the past, you
and I. There’s no place
for us now.
I’m lying
breathing heavily, sighing
the sigh that used to annoy you ever
so much, that’d make you ask me
what’s wrong? because you’d see
something upset in my mind
but my sighs are lost
in the silence and I start to miss
even the times we
argued as much as the ones
where we shared a smile
and loved
each other; and it’s
hard not to pretend
you didn’t die.
I was sitting
at home in the living
room, watching ‘Buffy’ when I
received the call. It
was late and I’d already wondered where
you’d got to, my mind
had been set racing, as it tended
to do, often, when you
didn’t come home on time
and the phone rang, and I smiled
thinking it would be you, saying
I’ve met up with someone
and become caught up, lost
in the enjoyment of the now
and I’m just calling to say I’ll see
you later; but it wasn’t you
and the voice
on the other end of the line, I’ll never
forget, soft, dull, brutal, a boxing-glove
of a lifetime’s punch too accurate to miss
the expectant beating
(Hello?) of the blood pumping
(Is that Miss Hall?) through me
as quick as the nauseating grief that at once
arrived in the pit of my stomach. (I’m afraid to tell you there’s been an accident.) I
dropped the phone, it
rested hanging by the table, the voice
at the other end
thankfully ceasing to mention you.
Pausing, a million feelings racing through my mind
I felt lost, disorientated, the smile
at the thought of it being you now
dissolved to nothing, where
your love
existed on my face
left, ultimately for ever
to be absent in miss-
ing you.
Once upon a time
There was a beautiful girl. I
fell in love
on the first capturing
of her wonderful face;
with the first conversation we
spoke together, it
happened
once upon a time, in
days gone
there was a beautiful girl, little miss
sunshine, who loved me and now
she’s lost
in the mind
of paradise, for ever
floating in the mystical space;
a girl with the most fantastic smile;
the end.
It’s time for bed now,
the place where
I seem to miss
your love the most, I
try to smile and think of you
lying there, touching
me, lost in each other’s minds
thinking it will last forever
thoughts suspended now you’re gone.