Pretending to linger
I make a show
of standing on the threshold
one shoulder inside
this room we’ve filled with moments,
cheeks smooshed against windows
limbs spilling, grasping
from cupboards unclosed
and floorboards lifting loose
to show the bodies
no longer hidden, buried beneath.
When Adam delved and Eve span, who was then the gentleman?
John Ball 1381
There are less of us these days,
the ones with the time to weave history
into cloth.
Once upon, they called this women’s work.
We stitched their names
just the same,
cut their threads to the lengths
they needed to be,
did not cry over the fraying ends
they left behind,
but moved on to the next row
of coloured strands waiting,
to be fixed in place.
Our baskets always bursting
with material for the making,
some scraps we took to our graves
though that tradition is gone as well,
with no one to keep the patchwork growing
so much is lost and moth eaten.
You and your dim accuracy,
head lolled loose
eyes whitened and widened
till the pupils blink out.
Words come clipped,
ransomed love letters
read like shopping lists,
or obituaries.
Call this a grey life,
the air sucked clear
your mouth a pursed funnel,
but I
am the culprit.
Found the bruises of your hands,
like marble sponge,
cold as stone
the heat slipping over you
without warming.
In the well shade you sit
while I sink deeper, darker
for the waterline.
Come up spitting dust
and excuses.
Shoulder a shallow cloak
of indifference,
already the hem unpicked
by those grasping hands
always tapping
rapping
at the weakest point.
Feel them at my temples
tonight, tomorrow, today,
at the weakest point
always tapping away.
Ah, I’m really hoping I got this right. The five Samuel Greenberg charms that I used for my response are as follows: dim accuracy / grey life / marble sponge / the well shade / shallow cloak. I tried to emulate Greenberg’s abstract style (though not quite as drastically as he employs the abstract).
When finally
the foot stuck in ‘was’ escapes the mud
and plants itself in becoming
there is a second of achievement,
of fanfare flooding out yesterday’s
shortcomings.
Until ‘becoming’ equals ‘was’
due to the addition of the second
and subtraction of the first.
Already there is the pull
of yet another step
half taken already
and calling.
Cup the whole of me in one hand.
Hold my belly up to a light,
judge my origins,
if I might be the real deal.
Examine my spine carefully
through this sheen of skin
while I burn like paper,
edges curling in as I smoke.
Test the me between teeth,
bite down, heads up,
crack your enamel
on my silver forked tail.
Spit me free
with blood and tooth
and every question asked
to test the mettle in me.
Wonder why I leave
with a word like love
so sour in my mouth
I choke.
Carol J Forrester 
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