I feel it all
As if it were colour
Spread across a sheet
And mixed in
How do you unpick red and green
Once it’s become brown
Smelling like smoke
The swirling greys
Rescenting to nil the oranges and blues
The chrysanthemums and tomato plants
But then she speaks
I’m a gift she says
Creeping in, forgetting to knock
Blindsiding
She tumbles you over
Twisting you in her hands
Stretching and squeezing
Until words fail you
This is a gift she says
Her squeeze suffocating
Breath is hard,
She snatches more than she came for
A thief indiscriminate
You end up giving her more
Throwing over bits of you
You take the stomp of her
The grittiness of her
The sallow breath
Clawing fingers
The density of her name
She rises like plumes
Until all you see is her
Take it she says
Slowly I hear her
I breathe in the ebb
Feel it more
Take back what was never mine to lose
The fog clearing
The weight shifting
Sliding off me
And I realise she’s right
As colour returns
And joy descends
She hurts,
That’s who she is
But look what pain has done to me now
I’m bigger than I ever was before