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first published in Matter 2, Matter Magazine, 2002

 

 

Sentence

 

Names were the first dropped stitches of self

in her unravelling, so he peopled all

her sentences with guesses and she laughed,

but left more and more half-said, as the cells

unlocked, unlocked in her emptying head’s whimsical

slow paroling of words, and then the questions,

asked and answered endlessly - “Where’s Jim ?”

“I’m Jim.”   “Oh yes !….. Where’s Jim ?” – and what hurt most,

her long wordless howls and her silences,

for she was leaving him, slipping through gaps

in herself while he cleaned shit, undressed and dressed

and tea-spooned life through slack, unwilling lips,

coping still and murmuring his name,

hoping for that as her last word, when it came.

 

 

Don Barnard

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and in the shop ...
collection -
"Growing Old Disgracefully";

pamphlet -
"Menorah",
Semicolon Press

anthologies -
"Ten Hallam Poets",
Mews Press;

"Perhaps",
Cinnamon Press;

"Broadside X",
Cannon Poets;

"Obsessed with Pipework 6 & 7", Flarestack

 


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