Weather warning

The cloud got off the bus, black and heavy

with rumbles already rippling across it.

It had started out light, peaceful cotton,

but was soon forced to drift into a haze of vapour.

Words began to weigh it down

and the darkness spread as lightning grew in its belly.

When finally it stepped through the threshold to home,

the crackles broke out and kicked down the flood gates,

roaring all the while.

 

After, free of all it’d carried,

it settled into a cosy nook of sky

next to the sun’s evening rays,

not a touch of storm in its makeup.

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Name games

Thanks, sweetheart. Thanks, angel. Thanks, love. Thanks, sugar. Thanks, pet. Thanks, darling. Thanks, treasure. Thanks, precious.

Words of endearment stream from people’s mouths so easily now,

I begin to wonder if they’ve lost their meaning.

Complete strangers calling me more names than my family,

my friends, even my spouse.

 

I never hear them call the boys ‘love’ or ‘darling’.

I wonder why that is.

I hear ‘mate’, if any at all.

Thanks, mate. Good job, mate. Nice to see you, mate. Well done, mate.

 

Sometimes, everyone seems to be a star.

But why?

We’re just doing what’s been asked of us, what we’ve been trained to do.

I suppose that’s it.

You’re just responding in a way you think you’re being asked, in the way you’ve been trained.

Where a boy cannot be a treasure, and a girl cannot be a mate.

You might not think that anymore,

but the words remain from when you did.

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Good afternoon, how

may I help, what can I do

for you today, oh sir, oh madam, oh

leech of my sanity. Strangled

by the curled black cord, tightening

by the hour, squeezing

the voice from my throat.

 

The record begins to skip,

the doll wobbles on her rotating stand,

mouth a sing-songing, singing

techno jumble instead of pretty songs.

The mynah bird’s voice fails.

Annoyed it flies away, ignoring

the deranged bell’s ringing.