The Disappearance

Her eyes were hazel, two agates

watched my every move.

Stroke

listen to her breathing quiet.

I whispered into her ear

tender words of mercy and release.

Stroke.

We lay quiet touching

this cold iceberg loss

unable to hide our love.

It hung like balloons over

the striped Mexican blanket.

The room gave up light

when she lay down

to sleep,

to dream of tall meadow grass

with me and the sun

instead of this useless ache I hold.

Stroke. Remember

there is no black hole but forgetting

and nothing more can be claimed

with my hot tears.

Small Lives

We lie by the fire,

arms, legs, my wet hair

and sleet burned skin.

I watch the Balinese shadows,

climb the wall.

As I dress,

your hand catches

my thin gold chain, scatters blood

coloured beads

across the hearth,

small lives, separating.

On my way home,

the moon no longer floats

but riffles like gauze

while a ring burns round it.

The muddy path is luminous

like the eyes of a fortune teller.

Frogs embed in the banks of the river.

I cross the bridge

skip over each fault,

and pull my mantle of secrets

across my emerald eyes.

His disappointment waits

like smoke

in a smokeless room.

My bloodied hands

press the latch,

Lady Macbeth before the fall.

Jude Neale is a Canadian poet, vocalist, spoken-word performer and mentor. Author of The Perfect Word Collapses, Only the Fallen Can See, A Quiet Coming of Light and Line by Line, Neale, Nish. Her new collection, Splendid in its Silence won the second prize in the SPM Publications Poetry Book Competition 2016.