Realistic Henry

Henry was never sure about June
when she fell asleep with her shoes
on in an unmade bed.

It reminds me of the time the man
I forever doubted collapsed fully clothed
after speeding home.

He smelt like ammonia and onions
long after June left Henry in 1932,
long after June tired of Anais Nin

loving her and sharing Henry's bed.
The man who lived when he wasn't half dead
left at all the wrong times.

I'd remember he let me be everything.
He liked me to pretend
I wasn't realistic like Henry.

Illness Has A Tendency To Make People Undress

There must have been ten of them,
some I didn't know. One was the Chinese doctor
called Joe. He thanked me you know.

For showing your arse? It's different in hospitals.
Not like home where her new hip dislocates.
Her husband helps her dress and they drive to the hospital.

Mother doesn't think illness has a tendency
to make people undress. After her hip is finally fixed,
she forgets to say the ususal things. Instead, she says

the left breast has always been different from the right.
The shape and size...it's like I should know even though
I've never seen my mother's breasts.

Water Torture

She'd like to think
a quiet regret would prevent
countless phone calls.

She's tried ignoring
him to imploring him. Brandy
works the best.

Superficial heat
warms finger tips to palm.
It adds a certain calm

deep inside
where she can't be harmed
while his voice

continues to blanche
her skin whiter than the moon.

Voices From The Grave

The sound of grief, gossip, relief, a circle
the pace of my feet.

Not happy to be alive, not happy to be out
of sight, out of mind,

months later, he calls. I tell him it was over
before his suicide failed.   

                                                                                                � Alison Eastley

Loch Raven Review Spring 2006 — Vol. 2, No. 1
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