afloat
I
can’t possess a moment
without
its shatter, or
sit
in calm without asking; for how long?
Look
out there (no, not there, follow my
hand): paper boats, guided by a candle, you see?
Soft
polite creases, moving
certain
as a promise
don’t
you want to ask them —
pull
them aside and ask,
how?
Nobody taught me this.
I was never
shown where to go,
how to ignore the dissolve and just
follow a light:
my
teacher said I would float if I held my breath, so
I
tried it in the bath
letting
the minutes spread out, cicadas
on
the shower curtain, heart
beating
like a moth against ribs
I
learnt to hold my breath for two minutes
just
to tread water:
first, your vision fuzzes
then you start to uncrease,
lesson: you are only safe
if no-one can see you gasp.
ghosting, wildfire
Try to understand: I can’t bear another dissolve,
would
rather crush a hundred boats
than
say goodbye so
I
absent you. I absent the nights:
soft
touching your arm
green
shot glasses, shards of laughter,
stars
losing
their meaning slowly.
Just
bundles of fire. Just kids pretending
to
burn the same way
|
we both woke with smoke on our hands | smouldering stars trapped between toes |
so don't you dare
call this abandon.
Some
plants need a disaster to bloom
they
rise giddily towards remembered warmth, as sailors
follow
other ships' paths without meaning to
here
- take back what
you
gave
our wakes running side by side,
these wildfire stars,
Nick Newman (he/him) grew up in China and Scotland, and
studies English Lit at the Uni of Leeds. You can find his work in
Capsule Stories, Stone
of Madness Press and Black Bough poems, and you can find
him procrastinating on twitter @_NickNewman.
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