3 poems by Judith Kingston : And I Am Doing Just Fine, Done.Just Done. , Not Quite Ready

And I am Doing Just Fine

The light outside hurts my eyes now and the streets
stretch up too high.
My palms are sweating at the thought of meeting
another person now.
I mouth ‘did you have a good journey’ and it sounds
like I am acting in a play.
‘What have you been up to? A jigsaw? Yes,
I too know about jigsaws.’
I cannot meet your gaze; my eyes slide off
your face, reticent,
like I am touching you;
like you are touching me;
like I am asking you to touch me.
I smile behind my mask and then blink-slow,
like a cat, to tell you: ‘I am safe’.

Done. Just done.

There is not much of you, you are spent.
You have been worn smooth and the years
have filed off the jagged edge of dissent.

Your voice now barely raises its head –
a tired dog, done with the postman and
chasing cars, now fond of the fire instead.

Too thirsty to drink, too hungry to move,
the windows are shut. The record skips
on the chorus and clean out of the groove.

I don't know if I am a friend or a foil;
a kite, dancing on a string, reaching to find
the thing that will bring you back to the boil.

Not Quite Ready

It was never a good time.

It was too hot or too cold
The leaves were too green
or the wind too chilly.
The tide was too high
or there were too many wasps.
The trains were delayed
or not running at all.
The paint was flaking off the front door
or the bathroom floor newly tiled.
The papers were too aggressive
or the verges untrimmed.

She had too many meetings
or not enough milk.
She had lost her keys or her mind
and her aunt was coming to stay
and her brother had said that
the moon was in Mars
which was surely
a very bad sign.

It was never a good time.


Bio:
Judith is a Dutch writer living in the UK. She specialises in unhelpful advice, nostalgia and mermaids. Her poetry has previously appeared in magazines such as Barren Magazine, Riggwelter, Kissing Dynamite and Ghost City Press. The latter also published her microchap Mother is the Name for God in their 2020 Summer Series. Most recently, her poetry has been published in Crossing Lines: an anthology of immigrant poetry (Broken Sleep Books).

A Fevers of the Mind Quick-9 Interview with Judith Kingston