Seventeen Going On Twenty-Five

For my second birthday my nana bought me a rag doll.
It’s still lurking beneath my pillows, hidden from my friends.

In my first year of primary school I stole a small toy horse.
My mum found it in my sock drawer and took away my pocket money.

I used to have nightmares about the gnomes in my grandparent’s garden. They always wondered why I never ventured further up the path.

When I was six I was a bridesmaid for my French auntie.
I didn’t wear a dress again until I was fifteen.

One Christmas I slipped on some black ice in Whitby,
now a lumpy white scar clings to my thumb like moss.

When I went to stay at my cousin’s I broke my sister’s necklace.
I hid the beads in my suitcase and said the dog did it.

I once went rock pooling in North Wales and protested when I wasn’t
allowed to take anything home; I sneaked a starfish into my back pocket.

At secondary school people told me I was posh because I used big words;
I told them they were being hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobic.

I was convinced I was going to marry my nursery sweetheart and drew my wedding dress to illustrate. Mum likes to show this to my new boyfriends.

I was twelve when I first saw Australia. Now I miss the full-faced moon that always looked brighter upside down.

When I was fourteen I bought my first Evanescence CD and Mike painted my nails black; just to be different, of course.

When I first discovered I was a Libra I got angry that my sign was the only inanimate object – am I that dull?

My favourite flower is the poppy. I like to imagine sitting on their black cushions, surrounded by red petal turrets.

Whenever my little cousins come to stay we play Harry Potter and find wand-shaped sticks in the woods. I pretend I’m not enjoying myself.

I have a mole hidden between my third and fourth finger on my left hand. I can’t wait to conceal it with gold wrapping.

Every time I watch E.T. I cry. Especially when the marigolds
start blooming. My parents make me watch it every sodding Christmas.

I write poetry best in my head when I’m in the shower;
in fact that’s where this one was written.