The Apple of Your Eye

I remember that day
The way old friends
Remember together
The laughs they have shared

The laughter now pittering
Into a dull, lifeless thud
That echoes the sound
Of my voice

Hoarse and distorted
Because my lungs fail
To release the stale air
They have been holding captive
All this time

That day the sun
Breathed little whispers
Upon your naked face
And kissed each freckle with warmth

I remember how hot it was
In contrast to your icy stare
The one where I reflected
Inside the hollow shells
Beneath your brow
        
And I saw that
The apple of your eye
Had rotted to its core                    

Growing Up

Do you think we ever knew
What would happen to us
When we were young and stable
And tears only flowed
With a bruise or a scraped knee
When the only drink in your hand
Didn’t hurt your head the next morning

Do you ever wonder
If colours will start to fade

Until they become just shades
Or if music can never again be
Accompanied by games played at parties
Where goodybags would be handed out at the end
And pictures would be taken
By adults with proud faces

Can I still paint a picture
With just my fingers and a star-shaped sponge
Or do I need a palette of dull colours
To cover up the beauty in our lives
When hearts were just paper cut-outs
And not fragile pieces of glass
When we thought being grown up
Was the only thing that mattered

A Love Poem

I want to kiss your skin
The way you kiss my lips
I want to eat into your core
And not throw away the pips
I want to feel your breath
Like a gentle breeze
I want to whisper in your ear
I know you like the way I tease
I want to know your thoughts
So you won’t be so alone
I want you to know that I love you
Until you’re just rotten flesh and bone

Unfcomfortably Numb

I clench my hand into a fist
Dig the nails in deep
I need to know that I’m still alive
There is nothing I can do to keep
Myself from going numb

I feel so tired
Tired of trying to reassure myself…
That I’m not going insane
I can’t find my breath
I can’t feel heat or pain
They told me everything would be fine
But what’s the point in living
When nothing feels like mine

And where does this all stop
Will I suddenly feel okay once more
I can’t find a trigger
But I know it’s been done before
I can’t keep thinking like this
It’s teasing me inside
Am I living or have I died

The Apple Tree

The seed we planted
Has grown no crop
Instead before me
Begins to grow – an apple tree
You said we’ll take the fruit once ripened
And use it for our own
But I’ve been waiting years
And still no fruit has grown

 

The seasons change fast
From sun to rain
But still the tree stands alone
No fleshy leaves, just bark and bone
You told me to wait patiently
That we’ll harvest soon
But I do not see a single fruit
And it has already reached its 12th June

 

Perhaps it is the soil
No nutrients to provide
Or maybe the sun has not yet shone
On the fruit that should be growing there with pride
For you were once excited to see
Roots growing strong and deep
But now you have fallen victim to apathy
And our beloved apple tree—
Lies in parts amongst the compost heap

Just A Little Bit About Poetry

I’m going to write about poetry in this post, just for a little change. It’s all from my opinion and view-point though. I’m not trying to convert people to my way of thinking or saying that my way of thinking is right. When it comes to something as diverse as poetry, there really is no wrong or right! We have the power to like or dislike certain poems, to understand them individually (as most poems mean different things to different people). But I think that perhaps we should all have a certain amount of respect for the poet, any poet, whether we like or dislike their work. Actually... let me rephrase that... I think we should all respect everyone for what they do creatively. Because we will never fully understand what it meant to the creator. We can analyse, discuss and debate works of art, literature, film etc. but we will never be in the position of the ‘creator’ and we should respect their work as something personal to them even if it’s not personal to us.

So why do I write poetry? Well, in year 8 I had an English teacher who was very supportive of my poetry and motivated me to write more. She asked for one of my poems to be published in the school bulletin (for little 12 year old me that was quite an accomplishment)! So if it had not been for her, I probably would never have really delved into the world of poetry – at least, not as young as I did.

To me, when I write a poem I feel a personal responsibility to make it mean something to me but perhaps something else to someone else. I don’t want people to see everything in the same way, the same light. It’s good to get out of that factory packaging we’re so used to! So I try to write in a way that has the potential to appeal to several viewpoints.

I wonder my dear reader, if you are familiar with The Picture of Dorian Gray by the wonderfully talented Oscar Wilde? I am almost certainly sure that you are! And if not… please, I urge you my humble friend that you go out and instantly buy/borrow a copy to read and ponder with! It’s a marvellous story. You see, when I write a poem, if it’s confessional, personal, about someone or something that I feel has been through or going through a tough time, I have this sort of superficial belief that by writing it down into a poem it has a Dorian Gray effect. And by that I mean; the poem has some sort of ability to absorb the pain from me, the person or thing I am writing about and a little stays on the page, stuck in the writing. Like the problem is shared and everything’s a little lighter.

But ho hum, it could just be me sinking slowly and not-so-blissfully into insanity… who knows? I do hope y’all like this little one-off post. I haven’t written properly in a while and itching like mad to get back into it! I hope you’re all wonderful and well, be happy and kind and expect a lot from life please, because there is a lot it has to offer!

Megan Xx

 

"Poetry is an echo, asking a shadow to dance." - Carl Sandburg

 

The Smell of Dust

To me, time smells like dust
Dust settled upon old books
Or falling from vinyl sleeves
Dust gathered beneath the carpet
Caught by high shelves
And corners of pretty things
You can’t remember buying

Dust that follows you in the light
And awaits movement

To carry on its journey
Through decades and possessions
Dead particles gathering new life
Helping to remind the living
That they too, shall one day be time
The kind that that smells like dust

The Actor

All we are doing
Is putting on an act
Our bodies stage props
Ancient and cracked
Our hearts the electricity pulsing...

Through sound monitors and stage lights
Mechanical doors and Camera flashes
The scripted lines of our life re-unites

And as we get up each morning
We reach into our very own actors’ wardrobe
To wear today’s latest trend
Worn all across the globe
So there is no individual cast
Of actors fighting for their part
Instead we divide them up
In class, intelligence, talent and art

Next comes our debut performance…
Do we want to be pretty or plain?
Strong, weak... a protagonist, a fool
A hero won or victim slain?
The choice is ours – they’ll never know
That we wrote the script
And sowed the very threads
We came prepared, equipped…

To be anything you want
To be the idol of your dreams
The flawed hero, handsome villain
Our faces forever on your screens
To pause and play and fast-forward
To your heart’s content
And when you are bored of us
There will be another to fill that boredom like cement

But all this acting, all this pretending,
Faking, bending-truth and fact
Isn’t at all that healthy
Perhaps it was all made to distract?
Maybe we should all open our eyes
And see that we are not standing upon a stage
We are standing on grass, beneath clear skies
We are not wearing any kind of cloak or disguise
We are here not to act but to improvise.

Waking Up

I recently put up a YouTube video of a poem I wrote, hoping to perform it 'Slam-Poetry style' but my performace style is awful! I have a looooot to work on (including being able to recite my poem infront of a camera)!
   So here is the video in all its mediocre glory (and poem below):

Waking Up

What happens when we wake up and realise
That we've been living all these lies
That good and bad stand side by side
What happens when we understand
That we're being fed right into their hand
Us 'the people' - the 99%
Forced to believe sin and made to repent
But it’s too late for any kind of formation
To replace the current system that beats half-heartedly to any occasion
There's no more truth to fall back on
There's no light to be shone
The darkness consumes any flicker any flame
But we're already too blind to see through this game
The fascists are just a disguise
The communists take pleasure in being their alibies
Republicans are harvesting oil
And the Democrats believe in earth and the land’s soil
Everything we've been told has turned upside down
There's no monarchy, no jewel-encrusted crown
And there's wall of apathy
Put up to control the victims in society
The ones who worked and slept and ate and wept
The ones who want money, a 2-bedroom house and job security
The ones who died of old age
Forgotten long ago when they succumbed to that rage
Years left to be alone
Their dignity ripped from them the moment they were put in a home
Their own family telling us they can't see what we see
Their mind has gone, there's no point in making conversation
They’re in a better place, their heads no longer capable of realisation
And then they die and their life becomes a tomb
Forced into a coffin, there's no such thing as death coming too soon
When you're 83 and put of sight
You were never quite right...
And now were all too susceptible
To be anything but replicable, predictable
It's too late to write on banners and walls
To speak against money and spam phone calls
So we all go back to our beds
Feeling drained from our hearts to our heads
Thinking is the last thing we need
I mean we've already planted the seed
What more do you want?
Red paint and your own debutante?
You need to go back to reality
You don't see through the eyes we see
We've had ours closed all along
There is no right and wrong
Good or evil...
Just money and people

This Land

Recently I have been listening to a lot of PJ Harvey's latest album 'Let England Shake' which is all about conflicts in war, soldiers and a whole lot of other interesting and important things regarding our heritage, country, lifestyle and so on. Its definitely made me think more about what I had previously learnt and read about wars, especially modern ones and of my Granddad who never really liked to talk about his time fighting out in Burma during WW2. I live very close to the sea, in fact just a couple minutes’ walk away is a large golf-course that ends into tall cliffs along the Norfolk coast. I don't know why but I started imagining a battle taking place there and this poem is the result of that...

 

Snow falling through the winter cold,
sharing with it - the dreams of old
Ice and sleet that pave the way
To where my loved ones forever lay
Cold bodies beneath marbled stone
The Same tomb that will one-day be my home
This ancient crest of land
Sowed by the workers ancient hand
Has once again breathed life and death
With only the bleached-white bones left

Of those who fought through gas and rain
Over trenches in the pouring rain
Fields ablaze with rich explosions
Shrapnel falling deep into the oceans
It's gaping mouth - harsh and bitter
It's teeth woven like thick wicker
And as the winter snow melts clean
Who would know what this land has seen?
Let the memories die with those there
To keep fresh again this winter air