peel and portion a tangerine
claire.ewbank
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warm and safe
In bed
Your head next to mine,
Our hearts fast
Because of the ones we love
And the words we can share,
All out of order,
Our own secret formula,
Two girls sharing
Like lights flickering
In the street,
Itchy feet waiting,
Trying to be patient.
Warm under and on the cover,
And safe
In the sentences of each other.
snow
I did not really understand
Why it was to white as snow
That you washed us –
Why not to silver, or to gold,
Or to indulgent indigo?
But now between the trees,
The mountains, in the valley,
I see your grace in these snow-fallen seas:
White does not glitter, nor hold shadows,
Nor perpetually deceive,
It is honest, it is simple, too perfect to believe.
The flakes upon my jumper,
Just as tales told they would be:
Intricate and childlike,
A complex simplicity.
Not impossible, just sewing up those seams/ Fixed moments, fixed justice in a world/ Where trust is on the floor in pieces./ Defeat is (perhaps) signposted/ At this point in the journey,/ So here we stop,/ We write letters: we question, we ask,/ We explain, we scream,/ And then remember the scene;/ Take new steps/ With a new day,/ Remember those moments when a journey/ Is the last thing we want to make.
You, aged me
I always wonder what it would have been like
To meet you when you were my age.
And I wonder what you think
When you remember before I was born.
Do you find it weird
To think that you, aged me,
Had no idea of the daughter who
Would be sitting in front of you.
Full of mango chicken and prawns,
Talking of lost money and new ideas,
Picking up her phone: her brother
Is ringing you (both).
We swapped news, like you say,
And I showed you this year’s hill-
Equivalent and we watched trains
Threading through the sky like they did
At P
When we were younger
And I guess they still do.
Poetry in dirt
They said you find poetry in dirt,
So that’s what I forgot I saw
In those yellow-green leaves lying
In the street, ready to eat
As we trampled them like grapes
When we walked home.
It’s these colours we love,
The way the world looks like it’s made
Of stuff we dreamed,
The reds seeping into the greens,
You unpicked the seams and let them bleed
Into one another,
Like I let you into me.
Have you seen the lights and the sky
Be so complementary?
That’s how you do it: no words
Just orange and blue
And a bit of time
And a passing line of laughter,
Letters on a phone,
Not because we know what we’re saying,
But because we like to speak,
Not because I know you love me,
But because you see the leaves.
Saw us with them,
Like children pouring out the paints
And taking delight in dirt.
So much tea in each house,
A mug of warmth,
Brown like dirt,
And our eyes like autumn,
Changing, falling,
Starting again.
His Watch
His watch was attached to his belt and his trousers.
I wondered why he wore it there,
how keeping time horizontal
and facing away from you
could be convenient.
He’d have to bend down in half,
fold himself up to just
take a glance.
“What’s the time love?”
“Wait a moment…”
A crack of a back, the roll of the eyes
And a summersault of the head-
“Half nine” he’d said,
Before climbing up his body again,
smoothing down his shirt
and pushing back the glasses
which had lenses in the wrong places –
they didn’t stay still as he wanted to focus on his watch.
Then I thought, perhaps he just keeps it there
when his arms are hot and sticky,
or when he grows tired of looking at time
and wants to forget it for a while,
so hides it from his craning eyes
and normally well-situated glasses.
He takes it off and enjoys
The nothing on his wrist.
It’s the little things
It's the little things
Which string us together: the small hands
In between the origami man and wife
And hundred children, one eager motion –
Would be broken.
It’s the coffee and the tea you brought us,
Or more the thought you gave us,
The cocoa on the top, the moments
You chose to stop to give to us.
It’s the photo in your hand, not even that,
More the definable smudge on the print,
Ink: life that will be, which will breathe, which will see.
It’s the brown autumn in my eye you notice
Every time you greet me:
Or more that it’s only you who notices,
Such little things belong to family.
It’s your laughter, the way you hit the table
And are able to hear a carrot break,
The breathing of the train as it makes the house
Shake, the burning of the morning
As the sun wakes us up, the truth
You pour around me and don’t attempt to clear up.
It’s your presence in my purse,
That first chord as we rehearse,
The ripple, the snort, the crumb, your thumb
On mine: the maybe-baby, the peanut, that smile
That time
Or the cross at the end of the message,
Divine.
It’s the little things which grow
Like children, before you know it
A single note and before you’ve sung it
A silent slipping river sings it,
Brings it, flings it
And small hands catch it,
Small hands shape it, create it,
And pass it on.
Poetry
Words Sword(s) Do(o)rs
Claire has been writing ever since she can remember. She was commended in the Stephen Spender Poetry Translation Competition (2009, 2010) as well as in the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Competition in 2008.
Claire speaks English, German and French and is currently enjoying exploring Arabic and Kurdish. Writing is like a game for Claire and the more words she has, the more fun there is! Over these pages you will find some of her experiments from the last few years.