Apr 21
Hello!
“Today’s (optional) prompt is one I got from the poet Betsy Sholl. This prompt asks you to write a poem in which you first recall someone you used to know closely but are no longer in touch with, then a job you used to have but no longer do, and then a piece of art that you saw once and that has stuck with you over time. Finally, close the poem with an unanswerable question.” [from: Day Twenty-One (napowrimo.net]
I knew what elements I wanted to tie in quite quickly, but I procrastinated all day before writing this – then we had a disastrous Persil Liquid incident that took an hour or so to solve, would you believe – so here I am fittering about, back dating this so it reflects that I did write something for Day 21. Sigh!
You were wild,
I sometimes wonder what life has made of you.
I know I’d never keep up now
(Barely did then!)
But you spring to mind through others’ faces, often.
I wonder if you grew into your beauty?
Alcohol and pills
Didn’t dull your hamster wheel at all.
Those hours we stole,
Curled up with our smuggled vodka
In a sticky booth
Counting my pennies for shots!
The too-close dancing.
That crooning through my letterbox in the small hours,
Rousing me from rumpled sleep;
My protective flatmates urging me to turn you loose.
That day you turned up, bloody, 
At that long-defunct-now store
I hated working in,
And got me an early pass
Because you were scaring the customers…!
There was colour in your dark,
And a nod to my more vanilla ways in your declarations
I just “wasn’t your type”.
Dancefloors and dizziness are what I see clearest
When I think back,
That, and the spill of your unwashed hair
Down a fluffy bathrobe,
Far too far past noon.
But you made a mean sausage pasta
And could always be relied upon to harbour White Clouds
Around your Blossom Hills.
With mascara, a curling iron, and whatever glad rags
Our fussy gay pal would throw at us,
We were always set for drama.
And usually found it:
Me trying to talk our way back to peace
While you growled from behind
And motioned to outside.
I grew up with Holly Hobbie aspirations,
Gathering the (now vintage) cards to my chest,
And dreaming of when I was grown and yet could wear
The Laura Ashley dresses.
Surely someone could fashion me a bonnet, too?!
And there you were, so raw and outside of my comfort zones
So full of hurt, and stories, and yet vibrant,
Jarring,
New!
I had resigned to being ‘boring’ before I met you.
We were plagued by our expectations,
A slave to the fact our brains wanted more, but our temperaments
Maybe weren’t best suited
To traditional academia.
I’ve never lived within that ‘potential’ I keep slamming up against,
Have you?
I think we clever women are hard to gauge:
And who would shackle us two, really,
and decide when our genius is spent?!
That took a loooong time to write, so I’m off to bed! Take care and I’ll be back…
Monty X
[pic is from here]
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