Xylem speak

They wait silently

to trap the deep dreams of trees,

floods soon sweep them back.

 

Motes in the Blue

Its eyes peer into the bubbles that are lungs,
watching as they burst and refuse to gasp for air.
The ocean spills from my lips as I summon it, whale song,
to sweep me away from the surface,
the pigment dyeing its hide blue.
Sea mines pulse as it passes by, erupting into jellyfish clocks
that snatch at my heart and chest to shock me awake.Clear.

Smother me in sediment, wrap me in coral,
split my skin with the shadow of sunlight
and let the deep rush in.
Help me dissolve, evolve, return.

Certificate: sea foam.

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Imposter syndrome

The first wall is set.

Its kin wobbles in the breeze –

Shadows shroud the skill.

 

Edges and acorns

The mountain doesn’t look like a mountain

when it’s all painted up with leaves and acorns

and leftover drops of sun.

It’s more an artwork on canvas,

something that I can appreciate but not feel squashed by.

It’s when it’s stark and white,

only its sharpness and jagged edges to display

that my head decides to landslide

and any progress I’ve made

erases itself until

the next leaf fall.

Vision

Spread out your collarbones, stand tall.

It’s how they’ll see you

when everything is trying to obscure you from their horizons.

Step through the doors that open,

but only if your heart tells you that’s where it wants to go.

If your eyes catch on another path,

even if there’s no sign,

it can always be enlightening to explore.

Tradition doesn’t have to stale up decisions.

Take the fresh air and use it as an arrow, letting it spin

until it finds your true north.

Captured fate

Dust streams off the road as dry tears.

Their hand is raised in farewell,

yet the heat waves trick the eyes into

believing they’re beckoning you closer.

Don’t take it, don’t step,

the wind cries, wrapping its arms around you

and pulling you away, away.

You bottle its colours, bright as glow worms,

and head off into the stars.

Painted dreams

The colours bleed out as I lie spent,

my canvas splattered

with every thought I’ve had over the past seven hours.

The stairway has another step,

the filigree on the hand rail

green shoots sprouting from my fingertips.

Your attention, please!

And standing, I take a breath

and place the last piece of the puzzle in place.

The click shakes the ground

and reorganises the entire picture

into a montage of how I got here

and the effort it took: the hours

of studying, crafting ’til midnight,

brainstorming in the shower,

putting on armour to shield myself from every rejection

and fighting for my voice to be heard.

 

The film keeps running,

I’m not done yet.

The Struggle of Acceptance

His dreams were chaos, the ground maggots

eating one another snap after snap after snap.

A vacuum pulled them in, and he with them,

squashing their soft, wriggling bodies against his skin

until they were pressed together into one.

Discord plucked on a silver harp, played

by her, who he’d never know again.

There was no telling what he was now,

crawling, belly low, through the neatly trimmed grass

attempting to exit the maze of cropped box.

Everywhere were deadlines, corpses of the past

left to rot against them. And he drinks from

the sullied stream where they lie.

It’s release day for my poetry collection, A Book For Pandora!

Greetings, everyone!

A Book for Pandora has been a while in the making, so I’m delighted to finally be able to share it with you.

Those of you who have been following me since the beginning may recognise many of the poems in this collection, as most of them originated as drafts on this very blog. Of course, they have since been tweaked and fine tuned over the years until I was happy with them – which, being of the perfectionist type, was quite hard for me to do – and have now been neatly ordered and presented in one solid tome.

So, without further ado, here it is in paperback and on Kindle.