Roaring Twenties

Falling through

The shelves of school

I had been pushing against

Since I was as tall as the first plank

 

Pressing my ear

So as to hear

The world that lay hidden and ahead.

 

Now I am here

It’s not the speakeasy I had imagined

For easy is not the word.

 

Why didn’t you tell me

That some of us

Are not taught the chords

So cannot play our symphonies inside?

 

And now I am underneath this dreamless sky

I find it impossible to think

Amidst this brassy cacophony.

 

I know I am only twenty-one

But I already feel older than my mother’s rings

Which waist her fingers

Among other things.

 

Yes, I am twenty-one

And ‘in my prime’

As though I am a sugary dessert

Served for those with a sweet-tooth

Of which I allow myself none

To remain good enough

For

Some

One.

 

Yes, my tongue is young

But I have always traced the truth

Or at least my truth

Into the pale ice cream scoop

I have not tasted

Since egoless youth.

 

Fleabag shouted through the letter box

Adorned on the door

of her father’s London home

I have no such mouthpiece.

 

So, I open my notes app

Bounding through London’s intestinal tubes

Trying not to be digested entirely

As I invest myself into you.

 

I am through the bookcase

Into my own roaring twenties

Trying not to think

About the picture-book old days.

I am a recent graduate from UCL having studied English Language and Literature. I am state educated and from the North West, having lived in both Southport and Manchester and have feel that the change from this part of the country to London is a big source of inspiration for my work. I am currently writing my own play and have a passion also for acting and performing.