Sam Alexandra Rose

Category: Poetry

  • stand back

    stand back:
    I’m writing poetry

    this requires two hands
    one to hold the pen
    one to grasp a piece of star
    and determine how it feels –
    what’s it like when those
    jagged edges cut the skin
    and does the blood glisten
    as much as this artefact I
    stole from the sky

    stand back:
    this is going to get messy

    there is crimson on the page
    crimson on my palms, crimson
    on the pen and now crimson in
    my mouth and the metallic tinge
    is how I imagine stars taste but
    I have to know for sure so I
    lean down and touch the tip of
    this fragment of space mountain
    with my tongue and it is like a
    silver shard of sugar tainted by
    the darkness that has tried to
    engulf it for a million years but
    it has endured until now – now,
    now it heaves its last breath as
    it lies in my hand. I have plucked
    it from its habitat and I have
    killed it. turns out the darkness
    was the only thing keeping it
    alive, and it flushes gently,
    dimming for longer with each
    pulse until it is nothing but a
    piece of grey coal and my
    vermillion hands are glowing
    as if it has given its life to them.

  • I can’t shake the thought of us

    I can’t shake the thought of us
    coming to each other’s rescue
    It’s what you always do for me
    and I want you to need me, too.

  • caged

    someone opened the cage door
    but I have nowhere to fly to.
    I fear my wings won’t take me
    far enough. what is the outside
    world like? which way is right?
    who would want me to fly to them
    anyway? I’m sure I’ve no idea. they
    might as well just shut me in. here I
    will collect dust while those
    around me take flight. I don’t
    know where to fly or if I’m even
    capable of flying, much less
    going on my own.

  • the definition of insanity

    I can’t remember who I wrote this for or why, but it was probably important at the time.

  • evening instructions

    Go for a drive after dark.
    Drive out into the countryside.
    Do it on a clear night.
    Take yourself somewhere quiet.
    Pull over into a layby, by a field or on a hill.
    Make it somewhere where you can see the important things. The stars. The moon.
    Lock the car doors.
    Take off your seatbelt. Make yourself comfortable.
    Look up at the sky.
    Look for the North Star and the big dipper.
    Look at the city lights across the way.
    Look at the fields.
    Look at the nothing.
    Feel the nothing.
    Be at peace.

  • I would rather have grief

    I would rather have grief
    than emptiness,
    is it so wrong to feel
    envious
    of people who have loved
    and lost?

    I would take a memory
    over a story, any day

    I would take a funeral
    I could actually remember

    I would take anything that’s
    more than a teddy
    and a grave
    and an empty head.

  • anarchy

    will writing my feelings cement them in the present?

    am I an architect of my own bad feeling

    or is it just anarchy, anarchy in my body and my

    mind? I am so scared of my own body and what

    it will do next and there is no elegant way to say

    that; the best way to say it is bluntly, but at the

    same time sharply, because that’s how it feels.

    I’m scared of my body but maybe not for a good

    reason, so maybe I’m paranoid or a hypochondriac

    and maybe I should be scared of that, too. My body

    is a teenager, so close to me, and my responsibility,

    but so out of my control and though this feeling will

    come and go, fluctuating as my body changes, it

    will never go away. Whether I’m messed up in my

    body or just in my head, I will always be this way.

  • yester-christmas

    Christmas day evening:
    kids sat on the floor in the middle
    of the living room, surrounded by
    presents, toys, wrapping paper,
    tearing open the next big box and
    waddling over, handing it to me
    to release the contents. Sitting
    on the couch unwinding plastic ties,
    fighting with cardboard – Barbie or
    a fire engine lying in my lap, waiting
    to escape from plastic prisons.
    Leftover turkey, salad, pigs in blankets,
    pork pies, yule log. Coronation Street
    Christmas special with the subtitles
    on because everyone is being too
    loud to hear it and there is no catch-up
    or on demand TV. There is just shouting
    and laughing and glasses clinking and
    toys beeping and blaring, fairy lights, a
    tree adorned with twenty-year-old baubles
    and a wonky star, musty metallic streamers
    criss-crossing the ceiling, the glow of
    the electric fire, warm bread rolls in our
    hands, and the outside world forgotten
    even if just for one day.

  • weight

    why
    is silence made so heavy?
    something
    so quiet should be
                   weightless
    and
    not a burden
                   frowned upon by the
    masses.
    there
    is a constant
                                   pressure
    to
    change. 

    I
    just can’t.
                                   and I’m not
    sorry.

    You could tell me being quiet isn’t a bad thing, but years and years and a whole childhood of being told otherwise means I’d never believe you.

  • skeleton in a nightcap

    you, my body, you are alien to me
    like a skeleton in a nightcap

    and we are two different people
    both disparaging each other, my
    disappearing self-esteem – I don’t
    know where that went and I don’t
    know where I’m going. But people
    seem to like us, and I am finding
    that really weird these days, and
    I hate that I find that weird, and
    it’s a problem, but not a bad
    enough problem to bother anyone
    else with. it will be bad and then
    it will be good and there will be
    no need for words anymore

    and you, my body, my skeleton
    in a nightcap, you will remain
    unearthly to me, and I will
    remain unearthly to myself.