Sapling
My father thought he could cure his knee
by swinging his injured leg over the kitchen table.
I'd collect my dolls to watch from the doorway.
He's ruptured his cruciate ligament, I'd say,
as if I understood the words.
From there I could touch
the taper and curve of his wooden crutches,
propped against a wall like saplings;
could imagine my black crayon
had made grains in the ash-wood,
lines headed one way, then the other – a pirate's map.
If my father caught me looking I'd flip my gaze
into the garden, to the beginnings of a plum tree,
delicate in the sun.
But it didn't draw me the way those crutches did.
Years later, that tree still stands. On visits home,
I'll settle on a blanketed lawn to sketch it,
adjust my pencil to suit the light, set the lines to be reborn.
I know this tree and its moods better than I knew my father.
Sometimes I'll think of his hands
gently planting the next-to-nothing of a sapling,
of his shadow where other shadows now fall.
It's as though I can see him.
A stranger picking plums.
(Second prize in the Ambit Poetry Competition, 2018. Published in Touching Sharks in Monaco)
Scoot
Made from long forgotten toys
and bike bits, my scooter arrived
on the doorstep, freshly painted red,
big and clumsy. My father hoped
scooting would put meat on my bones.
I got the hang of it straight away.
I'd clatter down kerbs, flatten daisies
and criss-cross empty roads. Sometimes
I'd carry foot passengers, mostly teddies
or an occasional obliging cat.
No one coveted my wonky pram wheels,
chewed rubber handles and tinny bell.
For years I scooted along,
not caring if skin peeled from elbows,
stones embedded into knees
or bubble wrap blisters appeared on palms.
I had the means to go between
the fields and the estate, the shops and the subway,
my house and friends. And to go alone.
The first time my scooter cried blood –
red blobs of rain-washed paint and rust –
I screamed. My father pushed his face to the window,
hands either side of his head
in defeat; however hard I scooted,
I still wore my bones.
(Runner up in the Gloucestershire Writers' Network Poetry Competition, 2018. Published in Touching Sharks in Monaco).
Being Swedish in Pontlottyn Rugby Club
Word goes around: Maria's friend is Swedish.
Boys in stripy tops line up
across the dance floor curious
to know if my life is all sex and cigarettes.
They tie themselves in knots
to get close to me. I make space
between my lips to let out the nonsense
of pretend Swedish. I tell them of forests,
herds of moose, the way to smoke a herring.
The boys wrap me in their heat,
their beery breath, their rugby thighs.
They hang on to my every word.
Later, on the train home, when I ask for
a single to Gloucester, please,
there's a dead feeling on my tongue.
(Runner up in the Stanza Poetry Competition, 2019)
My father thought he could cure his knee
by swinging his injured leg over the kitchen table.
I'd collect my dolls to watch from the doorway.
He's ruptured his cruciate ligament, I'd say,
as if I understood the words.
From there I could touch
the taper and curve of his wooden crutches,
propped against a wall like saplings;
could imagine my black crayon
had made grains in the ash-wood,
lines headed one way, then the other – a pirate's map.
If my father caught me looking I'd flip my gaze
into the garden, to the beginnings of a plum tree,
delicate in the sun.
But it didn't draw me the way those crutches did.
Years later, that tree still stands. On visits home,
I'll settle on a blanketed lawn to sketch it,
adjust my pencil to suit the light, set the lines to be reborn.
I know this tree and its moods better than I knew my father.
Sometimes I'll think of his hands
gently planting the next-to-nothing of a sapling,
of his shadow where other shadows now fall.
It's as though I can see him.
A stranger picking plums.
(Second prize in the Ambit Poetry Competition, 2018. Published in Touching Sharks in Monaco)
Scoot
Made from long forgotten toys
and bike bits, my scooter arrived
on the doorstep, freshly painted red,
big and clumsy. My father hoped
scooting would put meat on my bones.
I got the hang of it straight away.
I'd clatter down kerbs, flatten daisies
and criss-cross empty roads. Sometimes
I'd carry foot passengers, mostly teddies
or an occasional obliging cat.
No one coveted my wonky pram wheels,
chewed rubber handles and tinny bell.
For years I scooted along,
not caring if skin peeled from elbows,
stones embedded into knees
or bubble wrap blisters appeared on palms.
I had the means to go between
the fields and the estate, the shops and the subway,
my house and friends. And to go alone.
The first time my scooter cried blood –
red blobs of rain-washed paint and rust –
I screamed. My father pushed his face to the window,
hands either side of his head
in defeat; however hard I scooted,
I still wore my bones.
(Runner up in the Gloucestershire Writers' Network Poetry Competition, 2018. Published in Touching Sharks in Monaco).
Being Swedish in Pontlottyn Rugby Club
Word goes around: Maria's friend is Swedish.
Boys in stripy tops line up
across the dance floor curious
to know if my life is all sex and cigarettes.
They tie themselves in knots
to get close to me. I make space
between my lips to let out the nonsense
of pretend Swedish. I tell them of forests,
herds of moose, the way to smoke a herring.
The boys wrap me in their heat,
their beery breath, their rugby thighs.
They hang on to my every word.
Later, on the train home, when I ask for
a single to Gloucester, please,
there's a dead feeling on my tongue.
(Runner up in the Stanza Poetry Competition, 2019)