Poetry: “Swept Love” by Doryn Herbst

Swept Love

I really couldn’t bear
to look at it at all,

that piece of unrequited love,
that disregarded romance,
that unreciprocated 
desire.

I put his picture in a book,
so dull, so tepid,
I didn’t even bother
to finish it at all.

I put it high upon a shelf,
in a place I normally
couldn’t reach without a stool.

Then took a broom of
complete indifference
to sweep my love
under a rug of
I really did not mind at all.

Of wanting not to realise
the shredding of my inner lacing
under the guise of pretending
not to remember at all,
that piece of unrequited love.




Bio for Doryn Herbst

Doryn Herbst, a former water industry scientist in Wales, now lives in Germany and is a deputy local councillor. Her writing considers the natural world but also themes which address social issues.

Doryn has poetry in Fahmidan Journal, CERASUS Magazine, Fenland Poetry Journal, celestite poetry, Poems from the Heron Clan and more.

She is a reviewer at Consilience science poetry.