Liffey

...we could live in the old tenement housing just outside of fair Dublin city
and stagger home each night, cock eyed,
from the pub with all the money on the walls.
It was all the whiskey we could drink
after you convinced the patron we were somebodies
I walk with my arm around you and you cling onto me for dear life
as we drop our copper wishes from the bridge
and watch them sink into the Liffey
You slur and ask me if it will always be this way
Perhaps if we are lucky and the odds are in our favour
Drunk in love, on love
as we stumble home across the Liffey

Women

She pulls on the wig to deceive us all
Tonight she will play the character she longs to be
Flirtatious, vivacious, the carnival queen
She allows it to empower her
These newfound characteristics
Her mind is not her own.
As she takes to the dance floor
The flare of the disco ball stitches sequins to her pale unpainted cheeks
Her dress flares and bellows in the gust of our admiration
All eyes are upon her
Twisting and swirling to a tune only she knows the steps to.
The words to the song are familiar to us all
But hold special meaning in her heart
As she recalls the memory of love
That first twisted and then sliced her insides to smithereens.
Her moves take on an unknown force and she begins to stomp her feet
Calling forth memories of a tribal funeral march with each emphatic step.
The music builds to a dramatic crescendo
And she falls helpless to the floor.
The faces turn away from her
It is as if she no longer matters
The back of their heads smite her with every newborn conversation.
All except mine.
I approach her and whisper her name
The name that only I have knowledge of.
Her tear stained cheeks un-tuck themselves
From the safety of her foetal position.
She takes me by the hand
And we break free into the night.

In the nakedness of our embrace
Under the shadow of bittersweet confession
We carve our initials with hammer and sickle
Into the very depths of one another’s hearts
But she has the indecency to mock the words I speak to her
All the sonnets of my affection.
She holds a pillow over my face
And with sweet lullaby circling in my ears
She wills me now to sleep.
As she basks in the finality of my confusion
Her, the ambassador of empty promises
I give my final thoughts to her.

In the morning I find her now removed
And find I am embarrassed by my body.
I investigate and find my apartment strangely empty.
It appears she has taken me for all I am worth.
The canvas I had been slaving over day and night-
The self portrait of my soul
Has been replaced by a lewd doodle
a crude image, a memory of the night before.
I curl into a ball
And clutch her sketch to my chest
Drawn on lined paper, a page removed from my notebook
Which now belongs to her.
Allowing my eyes to fall closed
I hold my breath
And try to find a place to forget the reason why
I can no longer sleep at night.

J. Found in a pad, long since forgotten.

Here in the fourth season of our discontent
where daylight has diminished beyond all recognition,
the promise of rain reminds me of the tears still left to cry
We were meant to grow old you and I,
Kings and Queens of our own destiny
Instead,
we stand here on the edge of our existence,
forever trapped a September away from October,
dwelling on the faded reflection of a pleasant dream,
a dream I shared with you
Where we were skimming stones over fresh morning dew
and the first morning light warmed our faces
Now
as I walk alone
it just hurts my eyes
as Monday and Tuesday bleed into one

I become distracted by the bookcase and the names of all the writers whose work lives amongst the dusty shelves. Did they struggle with their words as I struggle with mine? Were their words so reluctant? Did they too find fault with the most casual of sentence, re-write the same paragraph over and over until none of the original beauty remained?