Two Wonderful Poems by Nick Newman

 

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.