VOID

A poem for today...

I

The rain's been worse than ever this winter,

the river spewing out onto the floodplain

and into too many front doors. It feels uneasy,

like living with an unexploded time bomb,

too precarious. The canal's banks

are lined with barges, whose owners 

are somewhere else. Even the tow path,

usually packed with joggers, cyclists

and dog walkers, lies silent and deserted.

It's quite eerie here in the drizzly mist. There is

a sense of dereliction. And I wish, like

the summer kayakers, to be elsewhere too.

II

An excess of knocks has left me paranoid -

although some men, it seems,

are drawn to that quirkiness in me,

at least for the short term. Loss

precipitates a descent into desperation - that state

which leads only to the next blunder

involving over-dependency. Emotional intelligence

gives way to fanatically searching 

in the most inappropriate places

for a kind of idyllic love

that could never exist in reality -

until that burning need

inside me drives yet another

substitute away. Mere resemblance

will never be enough. I see that now.

III

I cherish memories of that last summer beside the canal.

Cool shade, beneath trees reflected

in the still water below: another, reversed world.

It seemed our happiness would never end. 

Such joy to be canoing there with you.

We existed in pure bliss. All day the sun

beat down and butterflies fluttered

around us. Rowing requires effort in the heat,

you have to be prepared to sweat.

Now, the canal is too poignant. A memorial to us.

IV

In the dead of night, his arms

never soothe the hurt. The moon

enchants, but only the sun

sustains life. Now, the mornings

are a vanished lover. Cold emptiness,

a Dear Jane note on a pillow. Tears

are a dripping tap. I crave

some permanence, but I know

nothing except the pain: the flood

and it's brutal destruction.

V

I'll think of you when summer returns

and the floods have dried up. I'll be

canoeing on the canal again, only

this time alone. Stopping off

as we always used to, at the pub,

I'll sip white wine and listen

to your favourite song. It'll hurt,

God knows, it will. When you died,

I tried to replace you, to fill again

the void you left. You were, are, my sunlight;

my self-esteem. Without you

I am less than nothing...

But they're all telling me

that I have to go on living, that I

am worth something in my own right.

Oh I know they mean well, but

how can I possibly move on

with such a gaping, weeping hole

where my heart used to be?