I speak often of once

I tied plaits in my hair
and remembered
how you took stones
and made neat piles
around my bare feet,
dry from the sun,
and promised
that I wouldn't always be stuck.

Some pages from a book I kept in Rome

It is on hold until then

There is so much colour
inside each finger,
so many things that I have seen
in the days since
that I feel important enough
to commit to history.
And then there is
synchronised diving.
And it has all of my attention.
And so the memories
will have to wait
until it is done
and that's just how it is.

I am there, even when the darkness hangs like one thousand doors between us both

I know it ain't easy when your soul cries out for higher ground

I could have written this better.
Each line would have been heavy with meaning
and laden with heartfelt sentiment.
Literally dripping with feeling.
That's if I hadn't spent the last two hours
singing Think Twice by Celine Dion
in a French accent
to anybody who would listen.

Your salivary glands release saliva, a fluid that contains various enzymes

I have so many feelings
about so many things
that if I were to eat them all
one after the other
in quick succession
I would immediately
expel them from my body
and be left standing
in a puddle of my own mess
still none the wiser. 

When I hold your hand I feel like flying

There is us because
I too am familiar with the side of the moon
that hangs gloomily in black,
face to face with unending
and nothing else
and the thought frightens me
more so than I could measure in handfuls
or anything else for that matter.

Three steps into what is next

He laid out everything
he thought he needed
in piles by the door
and put what was left
of the life he had before
in bags sealed with brown tape
behind the sofa.
He felt it was time and
only then had it all started.

I had planted my feet and buildings grew upwards around me

You said 'You're never easy'
in between rain and still clouds
and I gave you my smile
cos there was nothing else
except the clothes I had on
and the coins I held in my hand.
'You changed simply because the years did'
I wasn't sure I wanted to be free.

I am there, even when the darkness hangs like one thousand doors between us both

She laid in darkness
and nothing else,
delicately whispering down telephone lines.
And each word she spoke
marched off into night time
in rows like ants
and marched faster still
until their tiny feet
slid effortlessly upon sinking sands
and turned quickly to wings
that fluttered and hummed
down long roads
and through fields grown high with yellow
and the momentum grew
and the hum
began to sing my name
and echoed
against the empty vast skies
that kept me from her
until the calls reached the window
in the room where I lay
and hovered there
waiting for me to whisper back
and send them on their way
to her, again.