Conjuring

We are on definite, clear ground. A concrete world, solid.

But around us are golden wisps swirling,
timeless truths, woven stories.

Children are knitted to it,
their worlds tumble naturally from the unseen,
crying out,
diving into the depths, intense grapplings.

We can reach out and grab these golden threads,
breathe and fly within them, shining.
We can conjure, flourishing. 

The End Eternal

Leaves drop golden and brown and grow again, green emerging.

You are gone, have lived,
a life full, pregnant,
as if it would never end.

Young children,
important work,
busy days, creative burstings,
that rushed tumbling,
passed to the end.

You are gone.
Leaves fall to mulch,
but there is something eternal.
Is it love? Bonds stretching,
wrapping around us,
everlasting.

Taller

Time rushes forward, an unstoppable train, smoke dissolving.

You tower above me now,
carving, moulding your singular way.

Before, you grasped my finger,
gazed, taking in all,
legs crossed in your pram,
eating the apple whole.

Old Friends

We have gone down separate paths, plunged different seas, brightness and dark, tangled depths.

There was a time we were knitted,
glowing, woven threads.
In each other’s lives flying,
memories shining.

There’s an expanse,
a chasm now,
but the threads are still real,
constant, shining. 

Rainbow Light

Your small grey barred walls can’t nourish and hold you. They are dark, constricting, squeezing; while you erupt fury and hatred - toxic, oozing, infecting.

Do you know there’s a land
expansive,
that can be yours.
A light shining from each of us.
Kaleidoscopic rays
that are named, treasured, blessed.

It is sad, tragic,
that you are locked in your prison,
that you can’t see it,
that you can’t feel it,
the rainbow light shining. 

Sunflowers

Two of our fledgling sunflowers bend over, a slit of pain in their stems, their leaves shrinking, curling in on themselves, contracting, not becoming who they are meant to be, who the sun calls them to be.

We use sticks and string to support,
to pull them up,
to encircle them,
to breathe in strength,
to grow towards the sun,
in joy, in glory. 

Caterpillars and squirrels

Furry brown caterpillar soft to the touch, marvelling. Under the tree in our playground street, as the rain poured, dry in our natural shelter squealing and laughing.

In the park grey squirrels
scuttling, pausing, looking,
I loved them so.

These snippets of my past childhood eyes
I can solidify them with my pen
in preciousness, becoming treasure.

Thoughts

If my thoughts could fall Like the autumn leaves branches stark, peaceful, bare, ready for God. 

To my medication

You have made me well taken away the imploding inside the curling up muffling shutters down darkness swirling the evil laughing.

There’s now a growth
A tentative rebuilding
I go gently, slowly
accepting myself as I am.

I’m not bright, bubbling
all of the time
I can be quiet and dazed
in my own safe space.

You have made me well. 

In psychosis

In the spinning downward dark, in the staring darkening nothing eyes, there was still a thread I grabbed and clung to, tapping my heart, my unique heart, It whispered me, Ellie, truth, home.

I heard the voice that loves us,
for all our individual uniqueness,
pouring love on me,
a unique, special person.

It whispered
I am still here
in this strangled darkness. 

Spinning on an axis

We are all spinning on an axis.

God and the Devil sit down
laughing,
wasting hours together.

They don’t want to do the business
of claiming souls,
because they are eternal friends,
integrated.

We are all spinning on an axis. 

Present, Absent

I’m in this silent place drawing with the pens you gave me. Your medals around my neck. Your rosary by my bed. You are ever present.

When I think of sketching I think of you.
When I see the woman at the well I think of you.
Your passion for women,
the light,
the full jug of water
you gave me.

You are ever absent.
Gone. Not with me.
Never to return.
Final.

Your memorial booklet,
your smiling photo.
It’s under my notebook,
I don’t need to display it,
because

You are ever present.
You are ever absent.