Friday, 10 January 2025

Four Poems by Rebecca Clifford

 





My Love


 

because he wore blue
          I noticed his eyes

because his smile was crooked
          I smiled back

because our first kiss was so clumsy
          I said, “We can do better”

because his family were cool
          I kept my name

because his brothers bred like rabbits
          I had to be barren
because we match wits and socks on laundry day

because I never made him choose
          he chose me




when we first met


you were seated at the left-hand corner of God

something you said         told me
                   there was synchronicity at work

with each encounter you drew me on
 
I blared my rawness    my want
I was silver trumpets   fuchsia beads at Mardi Gras
all neon                   all wolf whistle     all desire

you my lodestone       my anthem      my magnetic north
              

I   iron filings



Directions


He cedes      from our union
          wends west;
I, east          with ambitions
 to fix the world,
   unlock the mysteries of the brain
     stamp out disease, save lives

 or so I say


Autumn arrives

   I fall back           lose hours
scrape through the motions of making the grade
to pass          my heart less engaged

ennui’d I become a Christmas grad
and I’ve been thinking     of spring

                             all winter long



Fowl Play


 

She walked through the still night.

From a pool the bird beckoned;

a swan slow, silent, regal

played music with great wings.

Snowpure he uttered whispers,

soft secrets, assurances.

She fell into hypnotic black eyes;
and tossed her will to his consuming soul.

Blacker souls crept among the trees,
witnessing him toy with her, his game.

His serenade captivated her, bewitched her.

Leda saw, heard, felt it all
      as if from a distance.

At dawn, he lifted his milkwhite plumage

to the grey air, leaving her.

Central Park is no place to be at night.


-30-

 


Rebecca Clifford lives in rural Southern Ontario. She enjoys word painting, creating new words, resurrecting archaic ones and, along with life’s flotsam and jetsam, incorporating it into her work.  She is supported in these endeavours by her partner and a cat of questionable parentage.






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Four Poems by Rebecca Clifford

  My Love   because he wore blue           I noticed his eyes because his smile was crooked           I smiled back because our first kiss w...