Our lovemaking blinds
me with orange light. Sacral
chakra. It overwhelms
and envelops me.
My fiery lover’s touch burns
hot on my breast, belly, cunt ‘til
I am tempted to look for scorched
flesh, witches burn, branded.
I drown in molten rivers, heedless.
Clammy skin sucking, breast
flattened against breast.
Our lovemaking cracks
the ice of our midwinter sheets.
Melting the frost on
the windows for the duration.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
Sunday, February 18, 2007
Willow
Oh! How the mighty are fallen -
after thinking I was god or
the devil for an eternity
I found myself in the same
sordid world as the rest of you -
where homophobes shriek abuse
outside Centra, and even work inside.
Feeling afraid I don't answer back but
walking faster, cheeks flushing with shame
that surely isn't mine.
Oh! How the mighty are fallen -
after thinking I was the devil or
god for an eternity
I find myself in the same
serene world as the rest of you -
opening up then to a vision of what's real
I plant my own two feet squarely down
taking my own space
growing upwards and outwards
like a willow, though surely no sylph.
Oh! How the fallen become mighty –
Supple and bending, spreading
over and onwards each delicate
green leaf a new feeling
each fragile green feeling a new leaf
in the rewrite of the rest of my life
no bible in my garden of hades to
guide or accuse but those other
travelling journeywomen whose names
are shouted unheard.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
after thinking I was god or
the devil for an eternity
I found myself in the same
sordid world as the rest of you -
where homophobes shriek abuse
outside Centra, and even work inside.
Feeling afraid I don't answer back but
walking faster, cheeks flushing with shame
that surely isn't mine.
Oh! How the mighty are fallen -
after thinking I was the devil or
god for an eternity
I find myself in the same
serene world as the rest of you -
opening up then to a vision of what's real
I plant my own two feet squarely down
taking my own space
growing upwards and outwards
like a willow, though surely no sylph.
Oh! How the fallen become mighty –
Supple and bending, spreading
over and onwards each delicate
green leaf a new feeling
each fragile green feeling a new leaf
in the rewrite of the rest of my life
no bible in my garden of hades to
guide or accuse but those other
travelling journeywomen whose names
are shouted unheard.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
Holding the Fort
“…Three years after the end of the First World War the trenches were inhabited by rats, lizards, weasels and the as yet unburied remains of the dead…” Documentary – BBC Radio 4
I have spent many years inhabiting graves
crawling round the decomposed remains
dwelling in an ‘other world’
ignored by the living
as the dead were abandoned.
Call me vampire but I never
sucked the blood of any living thing
and I like to think that my presence
was small comfort to the souls of those
caught up in never ending screech of mortar.
Those who survived the trench experience
came home shattered, crippled with
rotting feet and scrambled wits
shaking in the permanent pounding
shells shocking, never ceasing fire.
Call these the lucky ones then,
whose bones remain without rites,
with a white cross to mark a resting place
never reached.
Small comfort the scavenging creatures.
The small and hot-blooded
or the quickening reptile
keeping watch, bearing witness, holding the fort.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
Splash
Hook, line and sinker I fell,
was caught, enmeshed.
Fishhook snared on the soft palate.
The barbed lure,
bitter… Sweet? Pain.
All a bit S/M for what I had in mind.
What can you expect though?
When all we ever did was
talk barbed words,
hooking into flesh –
teeth bite.
I was hooked, a hooker
captured me, selling herself
at my cost. I her pimp
to use and amuse,
floundering, painfully out of my depth,
got thrown back into the water –
Plenty more fish in the sea, love.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
was caught, enmeshed.
Fishhook snared on the soft palate.
The barbed lure,
bitter… Sweet? Pain.
All a bit S/M for what I had in mind.
What can you expect though?
When all we ever did was
talk barbed words,
hooking into flesh –
teeth bite.
I was hooked, a hooker
captured me, selling herself
at my cost. I her pimp
to use and amuse,
floundering, painfully out of my depth,
got thrown back into the water –
Plenty more fish in the sea, love.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
World AIDS Day 1999
I’d like to name all of those
I’ve loved and lost.
But they’re not all mine for the naming.
Those ones that I’ve loved who stayed
were never mine for the taming.
The litany of names grows
louder each year.
More candles to light. And the
furnace of my grieving pyre glows
ever brighter
threatening to implode leaving
me, a black hole.
Tenacious is my name and I
will not let go of my dead yet.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
I’ve loved and lost.
But they’re not all mine for the naming.
Those ones that I’ve loved who stayed
were never mine for the taming.
The litany of names grows
louder each year.
More candles to light. And the
furnace of my grieving pyre glows
ever brighter
threatening to implode leaving
me, a black hole.
Tenacious is my name and I
will not let go of my dead yet.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
I Didn't Scream at Birth
Her aversion to water
I'm sure
comes from having been drowned
at birth –
in the womb.
Being thrust out of security
the greedy baby sucked too soon
filling her lungs with the water
of the womb.
Life came hard that day
as a still-born baby
blue as if drowned in a river
emerged
still life
means death
and for all of three minutes or more
remained dead
waiting for the midwife's pronouncement of
still life
means death
still birth
no life
and still
life/spirit lingered
water poured forth
gushing a small cupful
of infant mortality
SPARKLED in the sunlight
SPLATTERED against the living room wall
and with it
fate sealed the bargain:
This life is yours
(c) Liz Willows 2000
I'm sure
comes from having been drowned
at birth –
in the womb.
Being thrust out of security
the greedy baby sucked too soon
filling her lungs with the water
of the womb.
Life came hard that day
as a still-born baby
blue as if drowned in a river
emerged
still life
means death
and for all of three minutes or more
remained dead
waiting for the midwife's pronouncement of
still life
means death
still birth
no life
and still
life/spirit lingered
water poured forth
gushing a small cupful
of infant mortality
SPARKLED in the sunlight
SPLATTERED against the living room wall
and with it
fate sealed the bargain:
This life is yours
(c) Liz Willows 2000
Letter to the Collective
Sorry the cheque bounced.
The bank manager needed proof
that we can pay it back soon
and as you have pointed out,
I have no income.
The £11,500 house that you insisted
I get a mortgage on
while you paid the deposit
just to make sure that working-class women would own property too
so that your public Marxism needn’t suffer
isn’t selling
and when it does I’ll have
maybe as much as £2,500
to squander
on my
debts of £3,000
- which includes your £500
so that’s a problem.
But hang about –
here’s the thing,
if I don’t pay you back
it’ll all balance out.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
The bank manager needed proof
that we can pay it back soon
and as you have pointed out,
I have no income.
The £11,500 house that you insisted
I get a mortgage on
while you paid the deposit
just to make sure that working-class women would own property too
so that your public Marxism needn’t suffer
isn’t selling
and when it does I’ll have
maybe as much as £2,500
to squander
on my
debts of £3,000
- which includes your £500
so that’s a problem.
But hang about –
here’s the thing,
if I don’t pay you back
it’ll all balance out.
(c) Liz Willows 2000
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