Like Modigliani

THE WAY SHE WAS

I must be patient now the way she was

for all those years sitting there in that chair

waiting for me to fix something for her

wanting to dictate a chapter to me

Sitting there imprisoned in that mad place

I knew she wanted me to take her home

waiting for me to read about Gauguin

wanting to paint like Modigliani

I’m the patient now sitting on the ward

waiting for the nurse to extract some blood

wanting the doctor to say that I'm fixed

I must be patient now the way she was

29012013

Posted to dVerse poets for Open Link Night

Sally's Farm

SALLY'S FARM

My dreams pile up like oranges
waiting to be unpeeled
layer after layer dangling like threads
enticing as a spiders web

Sally wants to measure everything
paint the whole house white
clean every nook and cranny
the list is endless

Falling down the stairs yesterday
I came here to get well again
but she's got me baking bread
and cleaning out the chicken coop

If you don't work you don't eat said Sally
choking on a piece of wholemeal rye
(like she feeds me anyway she just waits
for the van like my other carer did)

Sometimes the sun seems to go backwards
left to right instead of the other way
like the meds she forces down my red lane
making me and the front room turn blue

The television is monotonous
an incessant rattle in the corner
but that's the only decent company I'll get
until the meals on wheels lady arrives

24012013

My name is Amundsen

YOU LOOK A BIT SWEDISH

(I BET IT'S COLD UP THERE) 

If I looked the way he did you'd say 

You look a bit Swedish I bet it's cold up there

I'd reply the sauna's okay come on in

Afterwards when the snow starts to melt

we'll talk about the weather

you'll try to forget that my name is Amundsen

and ask me (like I'm a chocolate wristwatch) 

have you always lived in Switzerland

17012013