wheelchair

[eclipse]

These legs are now ghosts carrying
the moon who is pushing me back
to the wreckage of the car. I can
now gauge my new throne with
wheels that will carry me through wars.
Tree speaks close to where I was hit,
asking to borrow legs, he wants to stride
across clouds, who would catch him, who
would care?-he could tempt passing angels
to rest on branches and make real lifeless
limbs, put suns into wheels to float through
heaven's corridors. Carer unseals new medication.
what is the sound of two feet clapping? she asks-
followed by the sliding of tablets killing fires. Then
I remember carrying my heart on a wheelbarrow as
streetlamps sobbed electric tears, memory of how
a car veers into a cyclist was lit, stamped onto
a heart tipped into a postbox. Moving through the
city center tongues are parked on double yellow
lines with nothing to say, eyes are like the windows
on an ark viewing previously unseen creatures. I
want to fold up my wheelchair with the earth and
slip them into a charity tin.

 

[Benjamin]

Unusual and interesting subject matter with imagery that wends its way and interlinks in a style reminiscent of Louis Macneice's poem "Birmingham". I particularly liked the lines: "Moving through the city centre tongues are parked on double yellow lines with nothing to say".

[dcmarti1]

"eyes like windows on an ark"

 

Fantastic simile.

[Tinker]

Hi Barry, I'm not going to pretend to understand this. I've only read it a few times and I don't want to read it again because I feel it, like a punch or blow. Powerful writing, sort of Whitmanesque...

 

~~Tink

[rhymeguy]

I have read this many times. Each time the video images become sharper. I am not sure if this is a personal story or an observation of another's circumstance. Either way I believe it defines the thoughts and emotions perfectly. Great insight, tremendous presentation.