Poet

Assignment One

Poetry 101

Student: Leopold Green

Where I lived before

I used to live with my parents

In a house that smelt like cigarettes

And tasted like beer if you touched anything

The kitchen table was a bitter ocean

That came off on my fingers

There were three doors between the fighting and me

And at night I closed them all

I’d lie in bed and block the sounds

By imagining

I was floating

Light years of quiet

Interrupted by breathing

And nothing else

I’d drift through space

And fall through dreams

Into dark skies

Some nights

My brother Jake and I would crawl out the window

And cut across the park

Swing on the monkey bars for a while

On the way to Gran’s house

She’d be waiting

Dressing gown and slippers on

Searching for our shadows

She’d read us

Poetry and fairytales

Where swords took care of dragons

And Jake never said it was a load of shit

Like I thought he would

And then one night

Gran stopped reading before the happy ending

She asked, ‘Leopold, Jake. You want to live in

My spare room?’

Her voice

Sounded like space and dark skies

But that night all my dreams

Had floors