Poetry by Lindsey Woodward

Thomas_H_photo


Blind Mythology
​
She is blind mythology
with piercing duality and tireless mysteries,
her many miseries lure her away
so very far from my mind and her own --
Together we have compared histories,
written and revised our own elegies,
concluded that we have lived like ostriches
and fed reality to the porch squirrels and alley cats --
I listen for her airy morning footsteps,
the softest steady beat
as though she's tiptoeing --
she probably is, always
careful not to upset the halcyon dawn,
but her jewellery clamours out of tune
sends her stumbling --
she howls and curses and falls in her sleep -
down two gyrating flights of stairs,
down a fourteen storey elevator shaft,
wakes up with five cracked ribs and a fractured collarbone,
but can't recall her dreams --
she says the vivid ones happen during the day,
in the rich, warm soak of afternoon,
while drinking in sunlight through old windows,
while boiling water for tea,
or smoking her thirtieth cigarette --
She keeps me awake,
streaking pillows with mascara,
having arguments with god, with herself --
sometimes when she can't sleep, she wakes me
to crawl in beneath the blankets and asks me
to tell her about angels and heaven, and
beautiful things --
sometimes I do and she's out before I'm done speaking, or
sometimes I tell her the truth.




Winter Crisis Version I

In the hollow mists of swollen membranes
of angry white walls
that try to hide our smiles
and our expanding/contracting pupils
imploring the eggshell nurses
and the heavenly fucks of whispering darkness
of unrelenting nighttime

The ocean passed us by without a beckon
a beacon
I called to my shipwreck
he replied with the fury
of a thousand choking lunatics
sputtering on bile and waste
Make haste
as the blankets are tossed to the washers
And drink the slaves to emancipate yourself,
You crying ember, from Your loathsome fortress!
I was destined to fall into flames and emerge as a snowy ashen goddess
my romantic ideals have been swallowed
by my insatiable appetites
I’m starved for a Rose
Ravenous for a thoughtful gesture

Why can’t you love me like the sun loves the sea as it sinks and simmers?

I’m anchored to my truth but truth is hard to discern
when the World is your oyster
but you can’t find the pearl.




Wounded

My laughter erupted in red
sharp and unbridled
until men with stethoscopes
reduced this volcano to ash
There is no laughter here.
My hairpin lips creak
oily pink
leave a crooked path of crumbs
along rims of tea-stained mugs

Trace my past across deeply
nicked hardwood
where I danced in
red stilettos
over tufts of tissues that wiped rivers
from painted cheeks

It’s dark in here without a window,
like a torn orifice sewn shut -
I’m left alone to pick at loose stitches.

​

Bio: Lindsey Woodward began writing poetry at age 9 because she found pencils and paper easier to communicate with than people. 25 years later, she still prefers the company of books and cats. Born and raised in Port Hope, Ontario, she inevitably fled and studied art history and English at Carleton University in Ottawa. Upon completion of her studies, she returned to the area although she remains uncertain why. Her chapbook Huckster Piss (2008) was published by In/Words Press, and she is a regular contributor on The Mighty website.

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