museum island
Sophie Robinson

it’s the last week of my twenties so why
should i care what the weather does the weather
doesn’t give a shit about me             you said
all of this is me shedding my skin before i take
a turn              i imagine myself on the dance floor
of the themed party you won’t throw me      o there
goes that brat again she’s in her twenties
but really this year feels more like i’m throwing
up history              & sometimes my life
is too hot to stand up straight in            & i want
to run red leggéd down the stairs          but i can’t
get out of this tub just wheel
myself from place to place crying & slippery
& a bad thing to look at              how strange & crappy
for you to have to live with my face so often
when for me it’s something i glimpse & shed
like a t shirt     or to have to hear me at night
in your ear voice higher & sadder than i
imagined it to be       i do whine like a dog
whenever you go & you do seem always
to be going     keys smashing
on the concrete on the wrong side
of the door      all of this living & waking
is so unbearable      can’t find the cold tap
& sleeping feels like drowning
today the light plays us off
against each other      your head’s a halo
& i’m all in shadow      & as i slip
into & under the night like a sheet
of paper i will see your face your mouth
opening a great neon silent O
& tomorrow will wake up gasping
wretch white wine into the sink then go
to the nasjonalmuseet & stare at 400 years
of paintings of mountains & midnight sunlight
& buy you a postcard
with a photograph of a bum on it
because i want you to know
i love you
& i am trying to tell you something
& i miss your screaming light

Sophie Robinson is a poet and a lecturer in poetry at the University of East Anglia. Her publications include a (Les Figues, 2009) and The Institute of Our Love in Disrepair (Bad Press, 2012). In 2011 she was poet in residence at the Victoria & Albert Museum.

Well Versed is edited by Jody Porter (wveditor@gmail.com)
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