Poem: Jay Feathers

This is a weird'un. This poem is linked very closely to both the most recent one posted, and to the another few which are scheduled; they're all about the same person, almost documenting the course of a few months in a way that... Brings an energy I don't love. But they're also some of the best poems I've ever written, especially this one. It went through more drafts, and was shared with more people, than any poem I'd done before (and tbh since), and, annoyingly given later context, is still pretty much hailed as the best I've ever written.

So. Weird energy. But also, they're my feelings and my words and my great poem, so like, f*ck 'em.

Date is hard to pin down because unlike most of my poems, there's no single document conveniently dated with the finished product; there were a lot of drafts in a notebook and in DMs to poetry friends scattered across apps over the course of a few weeks. So I'm dating it 16th January, 2020, as this was the date I performed it at HOWL open mic in Swansea.

Jay Feathers:

I don't believe people can be made for each other;

I used to, but there's a lot of things

I used to believe and don't anymore.

I used to believe that I was easy to fall in love with

but hard to love, the same way I used to believe

stars are just suns who need too much personal space.

I used to believe I could never be drawn to someone

without blistering them when I came too close.

It's not that I think we were made for each other -

it's just that when you kiss me, it feels like all the stars

in my hollow chest finally remembered the sky they came from.

You ask me if I am a dreamer, your voice hungry

for what I brought back, fingertips dancing feather-light

across flickering eyelids. I draw back, hands

clutched tight, so certain it was ugly that I stutter

over my warning to stay back as you reach

for my shaking hands with yours. I do not want

to vomit my trauma onto your bedsheets

when you have trauma enough of your own already.

So when you coax them open, and all

that falls from my fingertips are the bright orange feathers

of a jay, I have your lips on mine, hungry and wondrous,

before they've finished settling around us;

I know you'll keep them, weave them into a cloak;

I want those dreams to keep you warm from your own night terrors.

 

You tell me you have never liked your own name

until you heard it gasped from my lips,

and I remember that your name was the first one I ever

called myself, the first time I ever called myself

a boy. I hold it between my teeth, test my tongue

around the edges, always knowing it was never right for me

but always drawn back to the sound. For the first time,

it feels right to hear; maybe you can love your name

because I formed my lips to speak my own, and they chose yours.

 

You point out that our bodies fit together perfectly,

and I want to tell you that my freckles are just

the sparks from where the stars in your eyes landed.

You ghost your fingers across them, lips tracing, teeth dragging,

and I am reminded of feathers falling from the sky

to settle a cloak across my shoulders. I want to close your eyes

and run the gentlest thumb across your eyelids,

to wonder what stars flicker and burn there;

I press the skin of my chest to the skin of your back,

hoping the galaxies in your chest can feel the galaxies in mine,

can remember the sky they came from, like I learned

to find home in my own empty heart, like I learned

jays nest only in the most solid oaks; sometimes,

you have to know the ground you are rooted in

before his feathers will fall from your fingertips.

I do believe that peace only comes from accepting that

the gaping hole in your chest will never be filled,

but can be painted by the light of sunsets.

I do believe that every breath is a miracle

of holding myself together on all the nights I learned

no-one else would ever love me like I had to love myself.

And I do believe that stars are just the sparks

of a bonfire rising into a black night's sky.

That your night-sky eyes looked into my bonfire heart,

and you aren't afraid of being burned.

That jays can be bright orange, even when the

textbook calls them brown. I don't know

everything I believe in, but for the first time

in a long time, I want to learn with you.

On Sylv, Spoilers, and Triggers

Yet again, I find myself preparing to start a post along the lines of "This seems like a dumb excuse to write a post, but..." but...

 

Okay, I got nothin'.

 

Sylvestus Vol II is currently undergoing a beta-read by a good friend and fellow writer. It's weird for a couple of reasons, all of which kind of come down to this being the first time in a long time someone with investment in the characters and world has read something I've written pre-publication, and as such has creative and editorial input... as well as just being able to yell "OMFG THEY DIDN'T" and spam me with exclusive memes sometimes. Friends used to read chapter-by-chapter as I wrote and vice versa, but as we all grew up this became impractical, and the last few times I've asked a non-professional to do a formal beta-read, things have gone badly (mostly in terms of them making promises and never coming through, which we all do sometimes, but it puts a strain on relationships and creativity, and made me hesitant to ever ask anyone i cared about to do it again). I'm glad I did, because she's great and it's going to be really healthy for the final product, but it still has weirdnesses.

 

For one, it's nerve-wracking as f*ck; I care deeply what she thinks as someone who I know has investment in the world and characters, and also as another good writer. The first time she sent anything approaching a negative piece of feedback (pointing out that a paragraph i already knew was sh*t was, though she phrased it much more politely and professionally, sh*t), I had to sit motionless and regulate my breathing for ten minutes so I wouldn't throw up with anxiety. I still have to manage that response every time it happens though it's gotten easier, and that's in no way a criticism; I wouldn't want someone who pulls punches, because sometimes as a writer you need to be punched out of your annoying foibles and punctuation habits (listen, i know i overuse the "mid-sentence ellipses to indicate a thoughtful or hesitant pause in the narrator's thoughts", but consider sylv makes a lot of thoughtful or hesitant pauses altho i will concede, yes, yes that is far too many, you could turn it into a drinking game and be unconscious by chapter 10).

It's also exciting, and the best feeling when she picks up on exactly the hint I was laying down, and amusing when she picks up exactly the red herring on the next page, and perplexing when she points out a character's response I barely thought about when writing it, and frustrating when she questions something I thought was obvious...

All of which are super important and the exact reason for a beta-read of someone who understands and cares about the story and characters. It was definitely the kind of care that was missing from Vol I, but there was just no-one I trusted who also had the time, and while a professional paid editor can point out your ellipses obsessions, they just don't have the same dedication to the story as a friend and, dare I say, fan.

That feels weird to say. Fan. Do I have a fandom?? It has like four people and a German shepherd in it if so, but I'll take it.

Anyway, there is one specific weird thing I wanted to highlight because it's relevant at the point she's at, and also kind of... where I'm at in the write/edit/publish/live journey. As the title says: Sylv, spoilers, and triggers.

Writing Vol II was triggering as all hell at points. It's triggering to read. In a couple of different ways. I want to talk about it when I'm on the bus listening to the Sylvestus playlist. I want to talk about it when I'm writing those parts. I want to talk about it when I re-read them. I want to talk about it when she reads them. I want to talk about it when a new reader mentions the allusions in Vol I.

Buuut it's all huge spoilers for late-game Vol II, so I've kept my mouth shut for about four years, because precisely one (1) person knows the full story of Sylv, and it's not fair to overload them every time you listen to the playlist on the damn bus. And I'll have to keep my mouth shut for another four months or so, or basically as long as I can last after publication. I've considered writing something and just saving it as a draft to publish when the time is right, but it doesn't feel appropriate because things change so much; I could have done that dozens of times in the past four years, and my views and feelings now are different to what they were then. Yet I also want to capture how I feel about it now, y'know?

I don't have answers, which is why, yet again, I'm writing a rambling blog post with a roundabout point on the subject.

I'll be very honest, too; another reason I'm writing this now is that I encountered a fairly big trigger in my regular life, and Sylv is a big refuge for me from that. I've gotten into the habit of re-reading the chapters I know are triggering for me when I already feel bad, because together they form a cathartic arc. But I did that like two days ago and I didn't want to saturate myself by reading them again because that way lies madness and "every word i write is incomprehensible garbage" - aaand she's about to hit that point, which means that in the next two weeks or so I'm gonna have to go through them all in deep discussion/edit/ellipses-removal anyway.

And I wanted to tell her about it and what was going through my head, because it was very personal but also interesting in relation to him and the story, but I... didn't, because... it was spoilers. And it kind of reminded me of everything around this *gestures to previous paragraphs* which is weird for me.

I think it will be good to eventually be able to talk about Sylv in all the full truth of his story. Both books are, but especially Vol II, about openness, with oneself and others, with becoming known, with vulnerability and its rewards. Yet ironically, I've been uncharacteristically careful with guarding his secrets, perhaps because everyone I would want to tell makes up the biggest base of people whom I want to experience the story without spoilers or preparation. Sylv has become a huge intersection of coping mechanism, personal project, and professional interest, and the boundaries are hard to define and maintain. And it has been interesting, to see what people pick up on and miss, bring up and skirt around, but it will be good to be able to finally talk openly on this blog about Sylv and, idk, sh*t like the ending of the book.

Sylvestus Vol II: The Rise is going to be extremely good, and it's going to be in no small part because of this experience and the person behind it. But it's also going to be good for me, I think. I said when I was racing through the second half of the novel in April-ish that I was terrified of the end and what that meant - letting go of Sylv - but as that approaches, I see the catharsis it will bring. I am Sylv sinking into the blood-tinted water: he seems at peace, but in Epilogue, we do not know why, cannot yet understand what brought this man to this point.

By Prologue, we understand. Or, I hope we do. I guess I'll find out when she gets there.

Until then, it will keep being weird. That's nothing new, though, for me or this book.

Poem: Love Reading

Actually, that's not really this one's title, 'cos it kind of doesn't have a title, I never settled on one - but this dang post has to be called something. Further, despite my intention to start uploading my older poems and work forward, after reviewing the past two years or so of my poetry, I decided to do a little run of my more recent ones while they're fresh (because they all kind of follow one narrative) then go back on quieter months when I run out of other sh*t to upload.

Regardless, this poem is dated 23rd December, 2019.

Love Reading:

Past:

The Star –

Remember when you had so much hope?

In a sky full of clouds,

You could look up,

Point at your own breath misting in front of you

Zoom in to every crystal of ice forming in the frozen air,

Smile and say,

See? Every collapsing lung is a hundred new constellations.

You didn’t come to me last time,

Or the time before.

Why?

What did you think I would tell you?

Caution? Rejection?

You have always loved above a safety net,

So certain of being dropped that you will never

Commit to the full swing.

Metaphors fail, because

If this were a real cliff, you would sprint to the edge,

Leap into the abyss,

Without hesitation,

Desperate to say that you did,

Willing to trust any rope to catch you.

But the rope is someone’s hand.

Someone who promises they love you.

Promises they would tear down the sky for you,

Rip open the night, write your name in stars –

And you have been left falling too many times

To trust anything other

Than your own grip

Burning your skin on rough fibres as you fall.

 

Present:

Ten of Wands –

You cannot see a way forward.

The journey has been so long.

You do not see what holds you back; you have been fighting

Through a thornbush, and it hooks

And tears, pulling you back, pulling you back,

And they say that the only way out is to lie still

Until someone’s loving hand reaches in to save you,

But who would come for you?

Who could you trust,

When it was the hand you loved most in the world that

Led you in, promised you stars,

Slipped away between the cracks in the earth?

Why do you come to me now?

Is it because you can feel the thorns,

Want to see their face?

Or is it because you know that the thorns

Are just your own clumsy fingers

Hooked around your collar

Pushing you back?

Do you want me to preach caution? Promise rejection?

You have promised never again so many times;

A warm hand closes over your own, a thumb tracing lightly

The chapped skin of your knuckles,

A promise held in breath mingling just inches apart –

Sprinting toward the cliff edge, pulling yourself back,

Scared maybe of offending with a misread signal,

Or maybe of lips meeting, of leaping, of falling,

Of hands being caught.

 

Future:

Two of Wands –

A way forward, pointing, a once-certainty once-broken.

There. That’s where I will be.

But this is where you are. You promised you would learn

How to stay. You are Here. The only place left.

Fingers slipping on the thick green moss,

Sinking in, boots on uneven stones rippling

With water, every drop of light a star

In a cascading galaxy,

Every breath green and certain.

Certain. Certain like a beating heart under your hand,

Skipping as you shift your thumb.

Certain like gravity. Like the dawn.

Certain of everything except a hand to catch you,

No hand except your own ever there.

Fear never held you back

From climbing a tree, from jumping

A creek. But it puts its fingers to your lips

And pushes them down, back to resting,

Shoulders tense now, guilt in the entertained thought:

To be loved; to be known.

You are a bonfire. You came to me to learn this.

Never forget what you are, my love.

You are a thing of ambition, of certainty,

Of burned-away regrets and the knowing of Here.

You say I do not advise,

Merely reveal what is already realised but

Not yet accepted.

You are waiting for me to tell you

You are too broken, too stuck,

Too wanting, too heated,

Too much.

All I can do is show you the stars you once made

With the outbreath of a hoarse,

“I love you,” sobbed to a back as it walked away;

All I can do is say,

If this were a cliff

Would you not already have jumped?