Poetry

Dismembered

His colour palette arouses me - an unspoiled heath.

Hair the tone of congealed blood, rich and dirty.

He’s painted in sombre colours, stolen from Botticelli,

with his skin young and sticky, like milk teeth.

Under the pall of a blanket, entwined beneath,

I lie breathing in his reek -  dark as black tea.

I think of grey fish - fucking on the bed of the sea,

giving his eyes their cold clarity. A fresh funeral wreath -

understands his solemn beauty. As it droops and browns

with traffic fumes and rain, it will smell like him

in the morning. Earthy as damp soil, grass and decay.

I collect his sounds and colours, each one I have found,

I wrap in peacock blue cellophane with ribbon trim;

to remind me of his loveliness, when my affection frays.

Maisie-May Lambert