Solitude
From pier-point we walked to the mountain slopes where the slate fell in slag-pile avalanches and the yellow grasses rippled against the breeze.
Your battered trainers barely survived the trip, so you carried them in one hand until the kissing gate, and left them hanging by their fraying laces.
With your footsteps just behind mine we scrambled for purchase, chasing thoughts like stray insects up the pitted pathways we’d walked more times than memory.
One by one they dropped away, pebbles tossed and bouncing, pinging out of sight and hearing until there wasn’t any further to climb.
Below there would be small slate rooftops and white wash houses with chocolate box roses around whorled glass windows, framing shuffling figures pottering from one day to the next.
Winded, panting, face shining and nose pink tipped you took my cheeks between your palms and pulled it close.
‘Just be here with me,’ you asked and for those moments I was. Together in the solitude of our mountain, barefoot and tired and palms stinging from falls and sharp stone.
I was alone with you.
Day Twenty-Seven’s prompt was to use long sentences in a poem. Since this was such an open prompt I decided to incorporate today’s Daily Post Prompt: Solitude.
What a beautiful shared moment. You used the long sentences, but they were not at all cumbersome as they can be. I loved this stanza:
With your footsteps just behind mine we scrambled for purchase, chasing thoughts like stray insects up the pitted pathways we’d walked more times than memory.
Thank you. It’s lovely how everyone who’s commented seems to have picked a different favourite line. 🙂
Well done. I find longer lines difficult to do. I loved this.
Thank you. It was a fun style to work in.
Beautifully written 🙂
Thank you. 🙂
Oh that last line! This is just super
Thank you. 🙂
“Below there would be small slate rooftops and white wash houses with chocolate box roses around whorled glass windows, framing shuffling figures pottering from one day to the next.”
Loved this visual. Lengthening the sentences sounds like a great challenge!
Thank you. It was really fun to work with longer sentences and it lends itself to more concrete poetry.
I think longer lines like this works a lot like a prose poem.. There is something so special with a long walk with someone special.. these are moments we all live for.
This is precious! Thoroughly enjoyable!
Thank you. 🙂
You’re welcome!
Enjoyed the writing, as usual.
That’s lovely to hear. I’m glad I didn’t disappoint.
Stunning images in this!
Thank you very much.
Beautiful – I seemed to walk right along with you. It reminded me of an old slat mine we visited once with friends in Wales.
I’m glad you liked it. To be honest, I was thinking about those tiny little welsh towns tucked away by the sea when writing this.
That’s great, your description was quite poignant. A mountaintop experience altogether
Thank you. 🙂
Really love the emotion you managed to work into this poem! And actually the long sentences worked quite effectively. A different technique is always fun to try.
New techniques are always good and they can teach us a lot about our writing. I’m glad you enjoyed the poem, thank you for commenting.
This is so beautiful. It’s a wonderful metaphor for a good relationship. Well done.
Thank you. It was fun working with more concrete imagery and telling a story rather than throwing up snapshots of thought.