• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to content

New Writing

  • Subjects
  • Latest
Poetry

Two poems from IMPLODE EXPLODE

Naoise Gale

Two poems from Naoise Gale’s first full collection, IMPLODE EXPLODE, published by Beir Bua Press on 2 October 2022.

 

Fred and Dorothy

 

he came back starved and scarred

and she loved him.

 

he bought sewing machines and

pork chops and snowstorms,

shielded try-hards and sickly kids

between the winds

and she loved him.

 

he nursed a dent by his knee

and kissed her quiet bones to sleep

and sang the asthma off her lungs

until morning ached

in the cold breeze

and she loved him.

 

he journeyed with mars bars

and gentleness,

rinsed the ghosts

from the walls

and she loved him.

 

he whispered yules

into existence and rained

in the garden

until it was all

a single shoot sprouting

from a damp patch

and she loved him.

 

he swallowed his trauma

like gum

like mushrooms

like Jesus thorns

and brighter and stronger

than anything holy

she loved him.

 

he upset a ward and

forgot her smell,

then held her in his arms

and held her in his arms

and held her in his arms

and she loved him.

 

yes –

he loved her regardless

and she loved him.

 

Dorothy and Fred

 

she lasted a war in the orphanage

and he loved her.

 

she learned cruelty from nuns

with truncheons in their habits,

tight-roped down bedsheets

with strong fists and thick glasses

and he loved her.

 

she grew moss in her chest

where infections never died,

and she spirited him to Norfolk

when life lost its throat

shadows cursed

and he loved her.

 

she birthed a home of potatoes

and maids of honour

and cans of Sunday pop,

slung nicknames around the garden

and he loved her.

 

she scribbled fresh memories

over old scars and skin,

butterfly-kissed

spring rain teasing dahlias

like sudden gold

in the orchard

and he loved her.

 

she swallowed her trauma

like wallpaper-paste

like rose petals

like coerced prayers

and brighter and stronger

than anything holy

he loved her.

 

she

sensed wolves, missed him

then held him in her arms

and held him in her arms

and held him in her arms

and he loved her.

 

yes –

she loved him regardless

and he loved her.

 

………………………………………………..

 

Wish

 

I would like to lock the doors to my

lungs and breathe out all my smoke

in one shadowy breath, I would like

 

white roses and tramadol to numb

the garrotting, I would like to lie

coffin-ready next to your grave with

 

my eyes on the sun and nothing

passing above me, I would like

lanugo and ivy to overrun this

 

wretched body, I would like to press

my hips into one thin pill, illegal-

white, I would like to hold your

 

hand and say it is okay, okay, okay:

we are all broken keys.

 

 

Share this post:

Reader Interactions

contactsubmissionsabout
design and development: Blackman Rossouw