Light fades on the troll bridge

The light was fading as we talked, water

sloshing against the troll bridge that I was going to leap on

even before you said you were expecting me to.

 

I love how you can take my whimsical moments and wrap

them in tissue paper and ribbon, holding them tight

as if I’d gifted them to you.

 

You couldn’t see the path, only the puddles reflecting us

as we strolled along, together.

It’s so typically you – focusing on what is truly clear

and taking the rest, no matter how difficult, as it comes.

Advertisement

Skeleton

‘Hold out your hands,’ she says

and places the silver key on my palms,

it fits across both perfectly. ‘It can

open any door you choose, anywhere.

Keep it close, always.’

 

So I swallow the key. Safe in my belly

it stays, and safe from my memory

until every door I face

declares it’s locked.

 

It can’t be. It can’t be.

 

The memory stirs and I try to regurgitate.

It doesn’t work, and the doors laugh.

 

From inside me, the key calls out.

Unlock.

 

The doors are silenced by my voice.

I swallowed the key

and became it.

 

Brilliant morning

I see the edge of the world as the water spills over and falls

splashing my fingers as I turn on the tap

 

The mist in the house smells of everyone but me

I suppose it would, for who knows their own smell?

 

I watch parts of myself spiral down the drain

no longer needed for the travels ahead

 

I hum as my toes sink into the grass, morning frost

making it soft crystal needles

 

I am awake now

Glide

I want to latch my mind

onto the back of a butterfly and let it take me

off, gliding past bushes and hedges,

swerving by faces and paws,

whiskers, beaks and speeding cars

up, up

to flutter around treetops,

when I can step off and walk along the longest branches

to gaze out

at everything.

See all the possible choices

spread out like drunken scrawls on a map,

overlapping and diverting,

all hinging

on one point, one inciting incident that leads into many.

There is no point in looking back at what might have been,

those pathways have already crumbled.

I can only look forward

and hope the winds from the multitude of wing beats

don’t sweep

my self away.