Addiction

You -
my heady
hangover
make my
head reel
in whirling
dervish
complexity
and
tumble-weeded
emotion
to wonder
why your smile
turns insides
outward-upside-down
into a rapidly
beating heart
and soul to
fall
so
ever
hopelessly
into
love-sick
drunken
happy
stupor.
And yet
I keep
on
drinking
it
all
in.

© Eleanor Clark
15 September, 2014

Memory

Today
We walked
On cobbled
Streets and
Wandered
Here
Then
There -
Stopped
To hear
Some street
Musicians
Singing
La Vie en Rose -
That you whistled

As we walked away;

Watched
The tourists
Dance to
The beat of
Drums -

Their clothing

Gently swayed

In time -

We saw
A rainbow
Made of soapy
Bubbles spread
Across the sky
And sat a while
And watched
The people
Walking by.

We talked
Laughed
And shared
Some dreams
A little -
And really
Just were.

No trinkets
Bought -
Instead
These streets
Of memory
Are souvenir
Enough
On
This summery
Afternoon
Of joy.

© Eleanor Clark

14 September, 2014

Shame

Sometimes I am
ashamed
of my fridge
and chocolate
easily purchased
at the corner
convenience store.
My life in
running water
rivulets and
Internet broadband -

How easily
convenient
these words are typed -

while someone lies
in a hospital bed
surrounded by
flies and
hazmat-suited
angels

Or as a young
girl traces
out the alphabet
in rocket-flared
lamplight -
striving for something
more.

I am no stranger
to suffering,
yet it too seems
privileged
when times of
plenty interlace
like the
puzzle pieces of
my existence.

This casual sense
of privilege
and shame at having
by luck
what so many others
seek -
is privilege as well.

So still I feel
ashamed
and wonder if
what I can do
will ever be enough.

© Eleanor Clark
9 September, 2014

Nostalgia

There was a moment
when we might
have paused
together in the
respite of some
shaded isle
and shared a lifetime
of sorrows and of joy.

Sadly,
though
we passed
like shadows
of a train
dappled
on white-wheated
fields of grain
in sunshine bled of colour.

You and I
it seems
was nothing more
than whimsy
and a thought
within a dream.

© Eleanor Clark
6 September, 2014