Mummy’s on the floor,

I shout with breath like marbles

rolling across the table.

There is a stone in my chest

A Lego under my foot

A box of crayons knocked over,

Flailing like sailors thrown

Overboard.

Sniff

Sniff

Smell fear

Smell panic

Smell death

Smell the smell of the smell of

The smell of

Gone.

I bite my lip,

Shocked like a TV frozen

On static.

My my my my my my my

Daughter my daughter.

R...

If only she knew

That the way the morning dew glistens

On the leaves is more important

Than the boy who stomped

Her heart to pieces.

If only she knew

That reaching out to you, to talk

Would take weight from her

Shoulders, steam from her mouth,

Sadness from her body, like a reverse injection.

If only she knew

That reading through a book,

Or singing a song, would help

Her to control the panic ...

2019, you weren’t kind to me.

For every

Every good thing

It felt like you

Gave me

Two bad things

In return.

Why is it

That you

Tease me with life and

Art and rhythm and then

Suck the joy

Out of my life

Like a mosquito?

Why is it that you

Reward

Other people

For my misery?

I am in a fishbowl,

Russian roulette

With the odds stacked against me.

So I’m glad

To be leaving you behind;

A steppi...

Go to London,

Reconnect with an old friend,

A warm, deep embrace....

September 24th, 1989. The day everything changed.

Everybody knows that my sister Harriet isn’t really missing: she’s dead. She was murdered. And everybody knows who the murderer is, too, but that’s a taboo subject in my family. If you dare mention my Uncle Terry in the presence of my parents, they’ll turn white as chalk and usher you from the room.

I was 12. We shared a room, Harriet and I. She...