Hard Landing by Allison Grayhurst

Hard Landing

A scattering of force
lapping up voices from street corners,
subway cars, seagull songs, using them as your own.
The flowerheads drop, dried in a jar.

You abandoned me,
once my shell had cracked and
my doom became inevitable.
You could have offered glue,
as there was a tiny tube on hand, in your hand, enough
to repair and prevent further damage.
But you turned your back, flaunted fake superiority,
based upon the good fortune of your stars and privilege.
Not the love of unconditional calm,
joining with joy and determination my plight with your own.

Your darkness reigns silent,
no space for whistling or pleading or singing.
Wave upon relentless wave caught the fish
and shoved it ashore. The tide receded
the skin scales became brittle
with the rising light of the sun.
Cat paws over lidless eyes, teeth digging
deep into fishy fleshy sinews.

Broken, it is broken, my body, our bond
of guilt, shaming and shame. Love
I have felt as a beautiful pressure within
– a mother’s strength of overcoming, and when
unable to overcome, kneeling until the miracle unfolds.

Your darkness latches itself to the upside-down illusion,
takes its breath and being from inversion, a lie
deep as your self-righteousness. Never come here again.
I seal my skin. I have this last straw, lack-of-pulse nothingness,
phone calls of perpetual chatter, deliberately avoiding the wound and
methods of healing. I deserve healing, debts forgiven, a future worth
upholding. I will not give up to the titling of the tree, but
pitch high, bypass your acts of conditional charity.

I love you, but the link that bonded me, broken
under your power, bonds me no longer. I love you,
and the honey flows, my windows are clean,
my heart has evolved, this way, orphaned.

Allison GreyhurstAllison Grayhurst is a member of the League of Canadian Poets. Three times nominated for Sundress Publications “Best of the Net” 2015, she has over 950 poems published in over 400 international journals. She has sixteen published books of poetry, seven collections and nine chapbooks. She lives in Toronto with her family. She is a vegan. She also sculpts, working with clay.

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