Tag: words

Your Poem Is Still Young

Your poem is still young
I have not mastered it just yet
I am constantly revising
still working on the phrasing

Your poem is still young
though its meaning is defined
I only have the final line
those last three certain words

Your poem is still young
each year instils new ideas
your actions suggest more rhymes
and we have many years to go

Your poem is still young
though I recite it constantly
my aim is to perfect it
through every day and night

Your poem is still young
I’d hoped to have found a way to say
to address all of the beauty and joy
there is in you, by now, but no

Your poem is still young
and I am glad to say that
it remains unfinished even now
open on the pages of my favourite notebook

Your poem is still young
still improving with every moment
as we lay together, safe in the flames
until the end of time, I’ll sing;

I love you…

Thanks for reading.

Give your eyes a break and listen to some poems

Highbury Fields

That sixteen-year-old words 
scratched there in my diary
could bring the two of us here
seems almost supernatural

A spring-evening walk, so like us
the us we were as teens
when you were my first
and still my only kiss
as we walked the peaceful parks of home

Now, so many years stretch across
a wide valley of unshared experience
they squeal and dance between us
slowly and methodically we close the gap
spinning our silken bridge of words

I pull the feathers from your lungs
they’re knotted and tarred
dripping with the bitterness of isolation
they’re catching in your throat

Your silences
and the space between those words
they say much more
they say it all…

Your sorrow is a blanket of leaves
your sorrow is blossom that falls
and covers this park…

Highbury Fields disappears
beneath the tears I know you cry
in your silent room
from your hiding place

Recently, I read again of all you gave me
when the two of us were lost together
so I ask myself ‘what I can do
to help lift you from this place’

What can I do for you
what can I give to you
only my time, only my time to you
the healing warmth of resuscitated friendship
as we walk the adult evening
through this pretty park

And you can say it all
you can speak it all out loud…

[2014]

Thank you for reading.

https://linktr.ee/tomalexwrite

A Longing Less Refined

You say you love my mind
the sensuality of all I say
how you long to craft a reply
answer all the longing I’ve raised
You lie awake wondering of my words
‘A glimpse is not enough’ you say
‘I want conversation deep
I want to memorise your soul’

Still I shiver for that burning connection
a longing less-refined
can’t you boil for an inch of this
can’t you itch for my lips
to be held in these thin arms again
You’d sweat and burn at night
for our next physical encounter

Your fingernails should mark my skin
There should be bruises left like sonnets
In the meteor impact of our collision
You’ll see the spark of my soul there
As I shiver up inside you

You bite your lip as I show my strength
and repeat until we melt into one
Forget the reading, forget the speaking
bite my shoulder
prolong this feeling
Away with words
Cut this talk
let me at you

Away with words, fuck these sentences
I want silences split with kisses
Sucking sounds and bitten skin
Trade intellectual for the sexual
As we do those things we do
So, away with words
Cut the talk
let me at you

[2010]

Thanks for reading this old poem.

I’d posted an extract from this one on Twitter last week and people seemed keen. This is actually part of a much longer poem but I’ve robbed all the best lines from it for other poems over the years. These are the remaining (previously unshared) parts.

Night

So quickly, it’s night again
the days are short
in times such as these
The sun only stays so long
only lays its light down for so long
then it goes again
we’re plunged into night

O, could you not find a torch
or a candle or a lantern
to bring some light in here
We can’t see any hope
swimming in this darkness

So soon, it’s night again
we’re on the same street corner
I’m selling your body again
I’m selling my brain
it gets so dark round here
I almost forget about the light
there is some light, sometimes
but right now
it’s night…

[2008]

Thanks for reading.

From the collection “One of These Years”. Available now.

The Prettiest Music

The heat shifts between rooms
from the front of the house, to the back
on the bed, your curled form is laid
I watch the sky as it cries in the street
blowing my nose, counting the people
they carry bags of food to their cars
filled with treats and sweet desserts
As I move to the kitchen, you stir for a second
this day is turning dark in the light from the loft
shadows dance, from the candles you lit

By the stove, I pause to warm my hands
not sure what to do, I don’t want to wake you
I sit back at the window, take up my book
but there are no new words to read and I place it back
if only the story would change of it’s own accord
O, I think it’s time for some movement
a raising of the silence, let the music in
just some small tune to warm this room
and your sweet progression of chords kissing my ears
I lie down beside you, cup your face
whisper some sickly greeting as you focus up on me

Come on love, we should make a song
you are the music and I am the words
you are the music and I am the words
we should make a song, my love
we should make a song
you are the music and I am the words
you are the prettiest music
and I am the most grateful words…

[2004]

Thanks for reading.