Day Two

Second day of NaPoWriMo and I haven’t given up yet. I don’t even know what, more precisely, prompted me to write this poem. My mind works in strange ways and sure makes odd connections…

“Pub” by Olga Vladimirovna Rozanova (via Art Inconnu)

Tea Time
by Kalyiel

In a voice like the chiming of a hundred tiny sliver bells she said only, ‘The dead should have charity.’ And she smiled. ~ Neil Gaiman, “The Graveyard Book”

Spicing my mind with lost words,
Leaking from crushed fountain pens –
Chinese fountain pens, small and black,
Round and fragile – I started to lay it for tea.
I took out some crumpled papers from the bin
And straightened them again, preparing them
For a long afternoon stretched between
“The past one never forgets” and
“The past trampled on and scattered”.

I rang the bell for tea and you came.
A bit discomposed, I let you run about
And throw lumps of sugar into my only inkwell,
Which you mistook for the teapot.
The teapot was on the night-stand, actually,
Replacing a stolen carafe of Persian wine.
But I’d forgotten. You made me drink
All the sugary ink until I started twisting:
My hands became my feet, my eyes – my tongue.

You left when I was almost done becoming.
I cursed you then, because no shadows are
As you are: mad and intoxicating.