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Wednesday, 24 June 2020

I Do Not Accept Drinks From Disapproving Men (A Hymn)

You got me when I was not looking, charged along the track without a warning
With unintended force you crashed into my calm
Pushed me to the very edge, I know you meant no harm
And I trust your well-meaning, your kindness-filled desire
To oil the machinations of us, to lift us ever higher
To clarify and reinstate our stations, yet I fell at every word you mentioned.

His words hit like a bowling ball - a strike for him, nothing for me at all
Knocked down with a clean fast sweep, tangled mess, feelings in a heap.
Winded, empty, helpless, confused, his meagre message left me bruised
Faux kindness ripped my soul to shreds, insides exposed, aching, raw and red
And no-one wants to see that - who wants to see that?
The entrails of despair and pain, pieces of gut chewed over and again
Till only sad acrid bile remains, semi-liquid, half-baked frame
Unfulfilled body collapses in again, spark kicked out; fuse blown again.

The force of each blow radiates through brittle bone
Teased, torn and tingled, every sinew, muscle, tendon
Tender parts provoked to rage, tissue flutters in wild daze
With saddened shudder veins vibrate, each artery impaled with desperate ache
Sorrowful shivers sent to every atom, naked cells quake suspiciously
This deadly sense of poisoned void trips me, tips me, closer to insanity. 

You disapprove because you feel that I have taken your love for granted
But this is not true, I value you and the trust we both have planted.
He disapproves because, well, I don’t know, but the disapproval itself is clear
Amidst these howling winds it’s bitter taste is all I hear.

Your words made me feel I was a failure; his words make me feel I’m a fool
Either way I am undone and on this unworthy cold spring night
I know that loneliness has won.

All signs of renewal have been suppressed like the hyacinth, forget-me-nots and starflower
She picked from the garden to comfort me with stems cut too short for water
Slow sacrifice to the drowning maid, instead, with attentive care we laid
White here, yellow, blue and purple there, petals pressed firm on to the page
Faces peer up as pages come down - crushed the life out of their colourful ways
Pushed and pressed to preserve past beauty, to keep them safe, these sorry souvenirs
Of what once was. Forget me not, but I know you will. And he will too I fear
(and would it have been worth it after all?)

Beneath love’s dark waves I am slipping, slipping, falling, drowning gasp of ocean air
Fills tired lungs, ache from crying, soothed by grave waters, suffocating
With death’s silent scream narrating.

All this love and no hope of salvation; all this love and no air to breathe
Not in these slow murky whirling depths, slowly strangled by malicious weeds.
All this love and no arms to cling to; all this love and no lips to kiss
No fingers to caress each moment, soothe with undulating bliss.
No heart to accept love and reciprocate feelings, to embrace and hold and welcome it home
Drowning with all these other lovers in all this love, yet I am here, alone.
We’re all alone with our unique obsessions, each lonely soul in its private passion
All this love and not a drop to drink; all this love our poor hearts to sink.

I want to scream ‘fuck off!’ at you, to push you away, away, away
Because the distance I already feel is more than I can bear today.
I want you gone because I need you here and I cannot have it my way
To have you here, it is forbidden, and what would our neighbours say?
I need to delete your omnipresence, unsubscribe from your daily views
Unfollow your voice on my video feed, block every last trace of you
Because you can do nothing for me now.. (it’s just me and the pain, again)..

His voice shakes. Is he laughing or crying? I can no longer tell, perhaps I never could
Perhaps all I knew were guesses at best - mere approximations of hopefulness
My heart harboured for him, from him, to you, to him, of you, of him
For you, from you and him, and you..

Can I only live this life if I erase him? How can I possibly live without you?

There is air on the surface, that much I know.
But for now, on this loneliest of nights
I will sink to the bottom and forget how to breathe.

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