This Dark Thing by Natalie Crick

This dark thing that sleeps in me,
It steals from me so I am left with nothing.
I am blameless, Godiva.
The murmurings are alive.
Watching you dully from my bed
I have taken the pill to kill.
I mourn my own death,
Drowning into the night.
My tears could devour
The ocean. I want, I want.
I have lost myself. But that is not enough.

*****

Natalie Crick, from Newcastle in the UK, has found delight in writing all of her life and first began writing when she was a very young girl. Her poetry is influenced by melancholic confessional Women's poetry. Her poetry has been published in a range of journals and magazines including Cannons Mouth, Cyphers, Ariadne's Thread, Carillon and National Poetry Anthology 2013. 

Dinner in Little Italy by Mark Young

For soup we had Carpaccio, the bowls so full of Venetian pageantry they threatened to overflow when the doges supplied as a complementary garnish were added.

A choice of Carbonari or Carabineri for entree.

Caravaggio was the fish of the day, its light flesh standing out against the dark plate it was presented on, the accompanying vegetables steamed to retain the piquancy of their natural color. We ordered a bottle of Monteverdi to go with it all but it had soured after laying untouched for so many years. A young Morricone was offered &
accepted as a suitable replacement.

For dessert lemon-flavoured Giotto eaten al fresco on the vine-covered verandah. Palates refreshed, we returned inside to round the meal off with coffee & Giacometti.

We put the bill on Amerigo Vespucci, pausing as we left to admire the Canneloni hanging on the stairwell walls. Those enigmatic mannequins followed us home.

***

Mark Young's The Holy Sonnets unDonne is now available as a downloadable pdf from The Red Ceilings Press.http://www.theredceilingspress.co.uk/pdfs/the%20holy%20sonnets%20undonne.pdf

The Murmurings by Natalie Crick

The poison drips steadily into my skull.
Lice are feeding. They are carnivorous.
She is biting away at my life.
I am merely a husk.

She watches me lie awake at night.
She lives in me, breathing,
Locking my heart away in a chamber
Where nothing moves.

Where the air freezes to ice.
I wait for a sound.
There is no end.
I remember the beginning: a death.

For years
We are white with exhaustion at what this thing is.
It is the last night of our lives.
Tomorrow I’ll be gone.

She is alive. Look:
It is beginning to hatch.
But it is dark. So dark.
I can barely see my own reflection in the mirror.

There is just some stranger.
We try to catch the pieces of me
Before they shatter forever.
Misted snow drifts over the remains.

***

Natalie Crick, from Newcastle in the UK, has found delight in writing all of her life and first began writing when she was a very young girl. Her poetry is influenced by melancholic confessional Women's poetry. Her poetry has been published in a range of journals and magazines including Cannons Mouth, Cyphers, Ariadne's Thread, Carillon and National Poetry Anthology 2013.