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Likestarlings is a place for talking in poems. We pair poets with poets and they write a sequence of six new works by responding in turn to one another. Our palaver blog goes beyond poetry to discuss collaboration in theory and in practice. Please take a look, and feel free to add comments, opinions and suggestions here. Read poems here
 

Weight of water


Mother has been drowned.
We saw her face lifting for air
– or so we thought.
Perhaps she was instead

surrendering.  Her hair
was beautiful, the way
it took on a slow Eastern grace.
Perhaps it was the hair

that stopped us seeing the desperation
in her eyes, the mouth an ohh
forever and her fingers pressed white
against the glass until it was too late.

Father had her coat ready
pinching the shoulders so the sleeves
hung hopeless and she fell
into its shape.  Her shoes are still paired

by the door.  I do love you, she said.
We held our forks ready as batons,
glasses of squash quivering in the hope
of Schubert – his fete of fish and streams

returning her to her body
as she laid out plates before us
and we, expectant as a quintet
taking breath before the first chord

drops its pearls into a bow,
waiting for her to say,

ah listen!

the piano

is so much more of a wind instrument

Don’t you think?