New poems by Yvette Managan

You Wait

 

I won’t unlock this splintered door for you
while buzzards scream at casement windows.
Sparrows gather bugs from under trees and
I remember. You mind. You stand outside,
complain again, gather dust on threadbare shoulders.
A breeze lifts strands of mountain rope-hair
off your head, they dance in moonlight,
smoothed by my own hand, you hope. Soon.
If you come in again, once buzzard memories pass
and sparrow thoughts roam off to other times,
you’d hand your clothes to me through
gaping holes in walls. You swore you’d fix them
yesterday when I rejected your return.
At our gate a crow beats wings in air,
his head and beak suspended,
aimed at roving sunsets, breast collecting
blackened light and dark ideas
while earthworms wriggle under fallen leaves.
Always standing silent, then and now,
your hands in pocket, eyes turned downward,
morning gone, dusted shoulders, august meanings,
birds attending, mouth agape, empty holes
closet skeletons, entrance barred,
tomorrow dropped like yesterday,
you wait.

 

 

Wasted at Dawn

 

You stand there old man, hunched, and babyfine hairs dance under tiny wind gusts that break round the corner of the building you lean against, older, older even than you, but it stands better, sandblasted often, painted, bronzed statues patinaed as you know you will never be. You wait, wait again, for a calling that never comes, nevermore, always pulls at your heart though, eh? Poor man, poor baby, have another drink, twist that soft brass-colored plastic from round the bottle-neck, slug it down, fine aged wine, maybe a week, maybe forever, she waits too. Dawn waits too, but not for you, never again, those days of splendor, nights of unrivals, sweat dripped off your face, onto her neck and she rubbed it down her throat, over her breasts, licked her fingers. Never again. Lean harder on those bricks, that bronze Eros, slam Night Train, you will be wasted as Dawn rises, from her bed too, from the east, always the east. Nevermore.

 

 

Scaling Down

 

scaling down on clitter clatter
and other things that just don't matter:
deli subs that made me fatter
boring gossip, idle chatter
ruby slippers, crazed mad hatter
fragile heart, so it won't shatter
bruising eye from asshole batter
swollen lip I wish was flatter
silent footfall, slumberous patter
I run fast, my secrets scatter
from all the senseless stupid natter
angry words that jump and splatter
around inside my bruised grey matter.
Now this quiet, just a smatter
- scraps of memory, a random tatter
of silly things that might just matter

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