Friday 15 July 2022

They're coming to get you, Barbara

I don't rightly know when, but I've found myself fascinated by the very personal micro-history one creates.




This is... They're coming to get you, Barbara


Those wild floral hours.
That morning complexion of a first kiss.
Bird song, tart as berries.
Now the late bloom buds never were as red.
They're coming to get you, Barbara.
Pressed meadow flowers laid along slender forearms
and dirty upturned palms.

As the sun loves the shine.
Sweat clings to this scent like a dress.
Smudged mascara, smoked breath.
How many nights has it wore on until dawn?
They're coming to get you, Barbara.
Clawing out. Ancient. Ruin. Fossil. Contorting, sleekit.
Midwinter creepit.

They are always coming to get you, Barbara.
And they're growing in number.
Trying to consume you with their crimes.
The lives you led trying to wipe out.

You've wondered lately.
How easy it can be to fall off the horizon.
How a round world has straight edges.
Are they gaining now, is the trail ahead ledges?
They're coming to get you, Barbara.
With wet church glass eyes blinking at you existing
Don't look behind, keep running.
They are always coming to get you, Barbara.
And they're growing in number.
Rising from earth of your half remembered form.
They are the harvest and the swarm.
They are always coming to get you, Barbara.
And they're growing in number.
You can't replant a tree as a seed, only chop them down.
The woodland  you're in is your own.
William Blake, Jimi Hendrix, Marilyn Munroe.
Vonnegut, Brecht, Kafka, Edgar Allan Poe.
Sharon Tate, Bach, Plath, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.