It’s for you, from me,
for the mirror warrior looks thin today.
The glass is buckling, crumpled
like my mother’s tissue cheeks
which are paler lately – not fair to make her
crackle down the stairs to answer,
not fair to make her dance again
around a question pool just as she spun
Swan Lake thirty years past.
Pick up, please,
before my hands trickle down
and puddle
into horse shapes like my brother’s back,
if he’s still morphed that way – I saw him
a few Decembers ago –
or those funny friends who dissolved
when school finished and the sun
was supposed to,
was going to –
If you don’t, will the grey hour smooth and thin,
my head lolling sideways and wetness coating skin,
or will I pose like Grace Kelly,
behind me a spectre spawning
while the cheating world has picked me up
and scorned me into strings?
Somewhere a red light
and numbers are flashing.
Aleks Carver