Empty Bedrooms

By maudsy

Mon, 18 Feb 2008
  • 2526 reads
8 comments
 

 

I saw you

The bedroom door was ajar
Their bedroom

 

We’d given them that room
And took the rear
Away from the traffic
Away from the noise
Away from the light

You didn’t see me
You didn’t hear me

I sidestepped that creaky confessional

Floorboard, our alert for when they awoke
Shuttling to the toilet
Or slipping between us

Uninvited but welcome

Snuggling into our space
Their warm little bodies

Heating our shivering backs

 

Watching you I became mesmerised by

Your stillness

Even when sunlight broke in and

Re-flowered you like a

Spring crocus and

The Dawn’s tender arms

Embraced and immunized you against

The freezing fist of irretrievable Time

Suddenly

 

An unpremeditated rage

Ripped you from your slumber

Like a leaping Jaguar you

Attacked the carcass mattress
Spewed bland blankets asunder
Ravaged carrion pillows
Tore out odourless under-sheets
Ransacked drab drawers for

T-shirts and Jeans to slap against

Window sills

Fired forlorn trainers under spider-less beds

Between the phantoms of odd socks

And as abruptly

 

You ceased

 

Comfortable back amongst the carnage
You slipped, smiling into sweeter thoughts

Bobbing in the tide of a long, forgotten Summer

 

And I left you

Immovable

Stole back across
Reliable flooring

To our room

To sit and stare too

 

At our flat even bedspread

 

Certificate U
Biography
Carpet Bombing and other poems
Love

Comments

Submitted by Sooz006 on
I *think* I got the gist of this, maybe... not sure I understand it.

 

Submitted by maudsy on

Revised version which may help with more clues.  Thanks for comments 

 

Submitted by Ewan on
Empty Nest? Not sure I understood it either, you see. I did like it though, and think when you come up with a suitable title, I will get it and so will others.

Author Page at the 'Zon
 

Submitted by maudsy on

Have revised but I'm afraid Ewan title is perfect.  Maybe some more clues in revision.  Thanks for reading

 

Submitted by maudsy on
I wrote it today - something I had in mind for a little while and so it remains a work in progress. If you didn't get it I don't suppose the title I've come up with will make it any easier but it seems to me to be an apt description of where I was going with this.

 

Submitted by Ewan on
Hmm. Well, even now (as before) I get a sense of loss and death, possibly of offspring. There you go. I still like it.

Author Page at the 'Zon
 

Submitted by maudsy on

Revised but cannot shape stanzas on this website despite several attempts so it doesn't look right.  The title is exactly correct.  There are no physical deaths being referred to here Ewan.  I do not like to explain whatever I am compelled to write Sooz006, whether that is considered poetry or not, so I won't.  I feel there are plenty of clues within the piece to elicit a reading but if not sorry.  Thanks for the comments both. 

 

Submitted by maudsy on

Does anyone know how I can adjust the lines and stanzas so they match the word doc I copy from?