I wrote this last Christmas morning, exactly as the title says, and I am sharing it with you now. It was one of twenty-five prose poems I submitted for the creative suite of my MA Creative Writing dissertation.
It will be the last post on this blog, or rather this manifestation of this blog. In the New Year it will be updated and renewed, just as I have grown and developed with my writing. I'll probably migrate to a more suitable platform. Whatever I do I'll keep you informed, dear readers. Best wishes for your festive season, however you celebrate it, and remember it's okay not to be okay. It's okay to take time out to look after yourself, to withdraw and be silent. To write poetry. Love and light to you all.
Christmas Morning 2017: 6.25 am.
Waking to coughing from the flat below, a dripping tap, a ticking clock, the fridge knocking as it goes about its fridgy business: cough cough: drip drop: tick tock: knock knock: cough drip: drop tock: cough knock: tock tock. Some of my shirts need ironing. I wish I could spend all my time reading.
Somewhere in the world a woman is crying. Nothing will console her. The words of a man will not console her. The nurse holding a dying man’s hand is so in grief she cannot remember why she does this. Who will console her? Horses in fields the world over whinny. In a tower somewhere an ancient enchanter casts a spell. The woman crying is impervious to it; the whinnying horses do not care.
The child in me wants to play; wants to call for my friends, take sandwiches and a sugary drink and sit around a tree stump saying rude things. In some houses, wide eyed children will be opening more presents than I received my entire childhood, whilst in others whole families will not eat. Each year the chasm deepens.
