Conversations With
The Sun
and
The Moon
Conversations With The Sun And The Moon
by Pauline Edwards
Copyright 2014 Pauline Edwards
Cover Photo by Francesco Ungaro
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Author’s Note
Conversations With the Sun And the Moon was the first collection of poetry I turned into a book. I self-published this collection as a pocket-sized spiral bound chapbook and distributed it to my closest family and friends for Christmas in 2004. A very limited edition of twenty copies were printed. The poems in this collection were written mostly during my teens/tweens when I was struggling with my first period of severe depression, and my first real heart-break. I’ve made only minor edits for formatting, spelling, and punctuation in this edition in an attempt to retain the authenticity of the original manuscript.
Table of Contents
The Sun
The Moon
About the Author
Connect with Pauline
The Sun…
Cannot Cry
I cannot cry
I don’t know why
but every time I try to
no salty tears come to my eyes,
just a jaded sight of you.
It is no lie
I cannot cry
and every time I want to
I scruntch my face and curl my nose
and think worse thoughts
and
hold my breath.
I cannot cry
don’t ask me why;
it doesn’t seem that normal
that I should be the one with you
after everything you put me through.
You think I would have learned by now
but you’re so wrong, you know,
I cant even make the sound.
I cannot cry
I don’t know why
when every time you fall through.
Careless is the One
Careless is the one
whose heart lies beaten
on the floor.
His love is dead.
This is it and nothing more.
Sadly sinking in moral’s boat,
sorrow yanks him at the throat.
And if his heart were in it’s chest,
it would
be sinking with all the rest.
But there it lies four feet in front
to stare and condemn a misguided lust:
“It was not I,” preaches the heart,
“who caused this mess, more some other part.
If you insist on ignoring me
to obey the one
you use to pee,
then be forewarned you will not
love,
but lust and lust and lust and lust,
and when your lusting all is done
you’ll end up the lonely one.
I will not stand it anymore.
I’d rather stay out
on my own
than be broken one more time
by foolish wants and careless nights.”
And then he sees his heart is talking.
What is this, it must be joking!
“My heart can’t talk! I must be dreaming.”
And so walks on the heartless man
to see how long an empty chest will support
his loveless life: a life without love
just sex sex sex.
Change
I was born with a perfect body.
It’s through my own fault she is poisoned,
doomed now to decay
beyond the natural
course of this life we set out on.
My body is now a host.
An incubator of more than just my one mind.
Her burden increased
is my sorrowful regret.
And not being able to separate mind from
body,
this disease is now part of me.
I will die unrecognizable
as the purer soul who
entered this world so long ago.
To ask why is to curse our fate
but the
question is begging
so on my knees
I cry.
Would the sun not shine on me again?
It’s more than a shadow. To the death I change.
Dark Blue Planet
Stop surrounded by the Earth
Take in air that breathes like ice.
Colossal feeling: that surge is pure.
You lose control of it tonight.
Step deep into the darkness,
let the stars eyes see your way.
You know the prayer you know the words
so let it whisper through your veins.
I can lose myself tonight
on the surface of my mind.
We can find the way together
drifting close your world and mine.
Let the sky set on the blue hill,
leave the clouds out there to dry,
when the water leaves the skyline
I’ll climb the desert mountains high.
See your gods they’re suffocating,
choking on rebellion,
begging now for you to save them;
give them life or let them die.
Stop surrounded in your madness.
Think for a minute are you here?
See your gods they’re up there drowning
while we’re crumbling down here.
And the Earth her breath is quiet
and her pulse a deafening hum.
Feel the rush don’t try to fight it.
This is it. Your time has come.
Stop surrounded by the Earth.
Take in air that breathes like ice.
Colossal feeling: that surge is pure.
You lose control of it tonight.
Forgotten Tree
Fire killed my family.
Burned them down
right to the ground.
Fire killed twenty-seven of my siblings
but it didn’t kill me.
I was not selected.
Here I stand still and quiet.
No whispering
around. There are no trees.
There’s just me
and I am not fallen.
I can barely breathe.
I am not fallen.
I am a forgotten tree.
The air I breathe is
cold and thick.
When my roots
drink up Earth’s water,
in my blood
I begin to feel sick.
In my veins
I begin to feel ill.
I could be here for ten more winters
or I could be here for one more day.
You never know just how it’s coming:
wind,
chainsaw, fire, or age.
I am old to those around me.
Half of them will see next spring.
I am ancient to the animals below me
who come and go and eat and chase.
I’ll be a ghost until I die.
I am a forgotten tree.
Frost Bite
Some old skinny tree
stood alone
beside the street.
Curving naked branches reached
up to the sky,
up to the heat
of the shining sun.
But such a shining sun
was hiding
behind a quilt of dark
grey clouds:
reverse blanket for the
tree afraid of frost bite.
Homesick
I don’t like it here.
I want to go home.
Nothing’s familiar here.
I want to go home.
Things smell wrong here;
It’s not like home.
There’s only English beer.
It’s not like home.
I know there’s nothing to fear
when I’m on my own,
but I long for my friends
to be near
when I’m alone.
And things are different here.
I want to go home.
In the Attic
The trick is to believe that it’s not even there
at all...
Like some kind of biological lightening bolt
it tears across your face as you cry,
disappearing as it appeared,
leaving you
wondering,
remembering,
sniffling in the attic.
And still, in this house of dreary
white drapes, draping drawers, and draped
mirrors, it stabs through a thick, dusty
cloud, not disturbing
the
dangling widow.
And tumbling from a chair,
just a push to the left,
an invisible cloud rolls over your senses,
sucking the breath from your lungs
as you try to inhale...
Holding your nose won’t work –
the trick is to believe it’s not even there
at all...
Love is
Don’t ignore your heart.
Listen and you will hear
all the things you’d never see
with your eyes wide,
my dear.
Don’t try to play your part
as if in some Shakespeare
play,
throwing tantrums
or driving lovers away.
Love is a bird resting on your window sill:
fleeting, yet in that moment a life fulfills.
Merry-Go-Round
What can I do
when you’re on your merry-go-round
but stand by and listen to the happy music?
What can I do
when you’re spinning round and round
but stand by and worry about you,
about us, about life.
Where can I look
when you’re dizzy and dumb and grinning
but to my lover
and to myself and to another?
And when you finally stand firm on the
ground,
you look around
and I am nowhere to be found.
When you finally stand firm on the ground,
look around
and I will be nowhere to be found.
Midnight Fix
Listen now baby
Mamma’s going out to play.
You’ll be alone now baby
but I’ll come back ok?
Mamma needs a fix now baby,
a salty moonlight hit.
Dream away the pain now baby,
turn my poor blood blue.
Early moonlight’s calling baby,
calling me to come out and play.
You’ll be alright without me baby
while I trip the night away.
As I