Painted Lady Motel

Cherry

By Silver Spun Sand

Tue, 23 Feb 2016
  • 2140 reads
6 comments
 
It’s thirty years since we booked in to that seedy motel;
Mr and Mrs Might-Have-Beens, if we both hadn’t married
way too young, as one did, years ago.
 
There were white curtains in our room – billowed 
with light – they accepted our presence the way 
a winter field accepts a solitary lapwing...
 
even though the bed creaked and the cistern leaked
and Dillon’s ‘Lay, Lady, Lay’, ran riot, on repeat 
around my head.
 
And after...the little boat we hired on the Cam...oars stroking
silken waters, and your hair – weeping into evening mist...  
as we lost an oar, then coasted back downstream.
 
On the way home – I recall you dropped me two streets 
from where I lived...where you picked me up, incidentally,
because of the twitchers’ brigade.  
 
In those days I didn’t drive.  Women didn’t tend to, then.
The trick for survival was keeping busy...keeping house,
keeping up appearances –
 
cooking, cleaning, washing; opening the door to angels...
letting them in; cold calling at its most intense.
 
Tonight, you begged me leave him – go with you that evening...
but then, what about the kids? And I said, “Forgive me,
but it’s been a terrible mistake.”
 
A moment missed, a journey not made, and how I wished
I could have opened to you, and that you had taught me to fly. 
Certificate 12
Poem
Silver Spun Sand Poems
Love

Comments

Submitted by skinner_jennifer on

A lovely poem Tina, of long ago love, then wondering what might have been.

Jenny.

 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Absolutely, Jenny.  What if? Indeedsmiley

Tina

 

Submitted by Starfish Girl on

As with al your work, beautiful images.'your hair weeping into autumn mist, one of my favourites.

'The road not taken.'

Lindy

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Thanks, so much, Lindy.  Your words more than appreciatedsmiley  

Tina

 

Submitted by EB on

Guess he's stayed with you in part, at least until now. You too for him probably. Wistful poem with suitable atmosphere going on in all that skillful description of yours. 

Submitted by Silver Spun Sand on

Thanks, EB, and just between you and me, I hope you're rightwink

Tina