All the crosses you carved
In the bread that you baked,
In the end, could not save you
From the steel-grey worm
That eats you
from the inside out;
Eats the names of the days
Events as they happen
The care that you took of your flowers
Eats the songs that you sang
The small things you wished for
Your laugh that could fill up the house
Eats the red from your hair
Your smoothness of skin
The spark that lived in your eyes.
I am trying to right it
Redress what is lost
Steal back your memory one cell at a time.
I loved what is lost of you
Must love what is left of you
Although some days I hate you
And some days I wish you could die,
But I wake in the night
Crying ‘Where has she gone to?’
And I fold like a child in the womb.
If I could I would save you
Would mother you, Mother,
Would suck you into my womb
I would grow you again
Enrooting new memories
I would give you all new songs to sing.
I make poems for you mother
Page after page piling up
As if this could save you,
Still you wake in the night
Crying ‘Nothing is ready, if anyone calls
There won’t be enough to go round.’
I am trying to write it all down
It is all that I know how to do,
To conjure with ink and with paper
These word spells that never can save you.
All I can offer are these,
Poor scratchings that only betray you.