Poem 21 The Wrong One

Lysander, in ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’, famously says, ‘The course of true love never did run smooth’.  Should we fall for the wrong person, this could be considered the biggest understatement of all time.
 
The bumpy process of falling in and out of love is only too familiar to most of us. It is painful to be spurned by someone you are in love with, someone who doesn’t want your devotion, avowals of true love and, worst of all, your looks of hangdog powerlessness.
 
I can look back and remember that feeling.  I wrote this poem many years ago as an antidote to rejection.  I went through all the anger, frustration and grief of the spurned lover before I wrote it.  Afterwards, I felt better quite quickly.  The very act of writing was empowering.  I was back in control!

   Hoover
 
You suck my marrow
like an oyster
shucked from its
salty carapace,
slurped,
gasping
for more.
 
You gulp my briny
eyes, secrete
my fears,
gobble up
the glances
of our
hands, and
belch.
 
You could
swallow me whole,
engulf
a whale,
la belle dame
sans merci -
no thank you!
 
In time you’d
squat below
my stairs,
a big green
vacuum cleaner,
choking on me,
 
aching
for afters.