UPSTREAM

Lifted out of our element,
the daily round of things
to be done and for whom,
I cannot breathe the sharp
space that might be freedom.

I gape after the active
emptiness the children
fan. The bright spectrum
they desire spins them away.

I who remember their long
spawning can not now still
that frantic swirl. Caught
unawares. Astonished.

Till I recall in their wake
what by bucking the tide
I denied.



COMPLICITY

We have been fish
in a net of light
swimming cross-current.

We are also the net.
We chose our design
as it seems to happen.

We know also it is this
our children have chosen.
A web's small intricacy.
The play of sun on water.

What we do not know is
why. What will reveal
the total pattern? When?

Fish fall to pieces in
the stream where they spawn.

The net holds. But what
will contain the net?
We cry so little, under
water.



PERSONAL EFFECTS

It happened. It happens.
All that happens to me
seems to reflect my intent
whether I know it or not.

I watch how I choose.
I know my intent by (in)
(through) what I do.

So we adapt and evolve,
learning what it means,
the effects of each act
which we thought isolate.

Evolve, turning out from
under. Spiralling
on.



DOWN THE LINE

With our backs turned,
how can we see both ways?
Our mothers' needs, our
children's, our own.

Turning point.

We look for love from them
who look for love. We send
what we call love to those
who are swaddled inward,

turning. The layers our
love sinks through, sinks
down to reach our hope.
Connection. Be there please.

The distance we span as
buffer deceives us. Back
to back, the long line of

women, looking ahead to
what they were and behind
to what they will become.

Our heads spin on their pivots.



TRANSMISSION

It's taking too long.
One or both of us will die.

Her fear is mine.
I breach, I panic, I
turn around right
in the dark red passage.

This is the terror
we pass on to
our children
who lie shivering
forever.

The cord that fed me
I feel the rest of my life.
Wrapped round
my neck. Cut off.

Is this how intelligence
starts? Regretting.
Regressing. Redressing.
Requesting.



THE SECOND OF FEBRUARY

This is the day a mother
may reclaim her daughter
lost to the underworld
these many months since
we mourned our girlhood.

This is the day the daughter
returns, retracing slow steps
up the steep path home.

Flowers await her, the feast.
The great year turns a new cycle.
Elements shift and seasons,
the fierce emrace of poppies.

But why does the young one
fall slack in the open arms,
why is the purified one
empty of essence, what has
possessed her, my daughter?

Shadows on the thick snow, a
black dog romping like fear,
like memory, and the poppies
turn poinsettia.



RELATIVES

I'd like to get to the truths
of this. All is not well.
We stoop to conquer.

I speak. You speak. Do we
listen? Thank you for
demanding I hear you.

The truth is. The truth is
I have not liked you well enough.
The truth is how absolutely
I do love you.

Two truths are known. You. Me.
Same. Similar. Not other.
I did not want to be you.

I did not want to like you
when you wanted me to be like
what you wanted me to be.

Two truths will make us one.
The truce shall set us free.



HIGH HOPES

What can I say as you too
at eight enter the world?
Your friends curl their hair,
wonder what on earth to wear.

Your colours blend, you know
all the rules of camouflage.
You're becoming your friends
and I am not their mothers.

Practise looking pretty just
like your friends and their
mothers. Blow dry your hair
and brush the sheen round.

It's so straight and you hate
it, so pin it up. Roll it.
Make it just like the photos.
Nothing different. Wear a new

cranberry dress and cranberry
shoes. There's so much to lose
it's hard not to choose with
the others. And their mothers.

When you're eight. When you're
late. And the world is waiting
for you to catch it by a braid
and swing it round to a bun.

Till your friends watch what you
wear and copy-cat how. Beauty,
you're such a big girl now.



EASY ANSWERS

Cutting through space, a vapour trail
your movement follows you. You think
the moon in the water follows you.

The moon image dances the thaw
among chittering ice floes as
you shake your head to the song
inside. The two of you shining,
dancing rainbows through the fog.

"Want to see the moon sing me
her very own song? Want to
see the moon move after me?
She'll do anything I want.
One, two, three, four. Go!"

There are more illusions to this
game of beauty than you can count.
Or count upon. Catching cold.

For who can say but you wherever
the sun gathers sundogs, refraction
of its bright intent. You are sure
you are the sun, you are the moon.

One among many. And only you know
what's true in the shimmer of desire.
So many guises to beguile you into
the chill of glamour. So young.