It's Still Life

For Visual Verse Anthology on Instagram

I’ve Been Thinking About

Lost friends that I used to ring,
to wish them a happy birthday,
or maybe complain about work,

or the sort of friends that you
wouldn’t ring because you weren’t
that close, or maybe you would

ring them once every few years,
and then you’d feel all warm
and kindhearted for doing it.

But mostly I’m thinking about
friends you ring up, and say
Hi. How’s the weather.
Is it raining over there?
Yeah, here, too. And they’d
say, But it’s not flooding yet.

Written for Visual Verse Anthology on Instagram. Photo by Erik Mclean on Unsplash © Misky 2021

Misky

Dec 1, 2021

Poetry

17 responses to “For Visual Verse Anthology on Instagram”

Hobbo

Dec 1, 2021 at 4:17 pm

Well written, as always. Friends, like enemies, live on a continuum and their places can alter over time.

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1. Misky
  
  Dec 1, 2021 at 5:15 pm
  
  And my Christmas card list has shrunk considerably. It’s not that we aren’t friends anymore; they just up and died last year. Most from Covid, one from cancer, one car crash, one heart attack whilst driving a tractor, and so on. Eight in total. In one year. It makes you want to keep looking over your shoulder.
  
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  1. abigfatcanofworms
    
    Dec 1, 2021 at 9:20 pm
    
    Oh gosh. That’s awful, Misky.
    
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    1. Misky
      
      Dec 1, 2021 at 10:50 pm
      
      It’s been a rough few years, that’s for sure.
      
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  2. Hobbo
    
    Dec 2, 2021 at 7:18 pm
    
    Blimey, eight in a year is horrendous. Just you be careful when you are driving that tractor down the M6 for your covid jab!
    
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    1. Misky
      
      Dec 2, 2021 at 7:43 pm
      
      😂😂
      
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ben Alexander

Dec 1, 2021 at 4:30 pm

Beautifully melancholy…

❤
David

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1. Misky
  
  Dec 1, 2021 at 5:08 pm
  
  Thanks, David. 🥰
  
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abigfatcanofworms

Dec 1, 2021 at 9:25 pm

I love the last stanza. I didn’t read much melancholy into it although looking back, I see the “lost” in the first line and realize I should’ve carried that word through. I subscribe to Nick Cave’s website “The Red Hand Files” and recently I got an email in which he described levels of friendship. He expresses himself very well. And I was thinking about that and thinking about the different ways people talk about friendship. But now, looking back, I see the relief in the last line of your poem. And it is so poignant.

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1. Misky
  
  Dec 1, 2021 at 10:48 pm
  
  It didn’t feel particularly melancholic as I wrote it. It felt more like “those are the facts of it”. In my experience, we grow and evolve, and some friendships grow with us. Some don’t. But we always carry the memories of them with us.
  
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  1. abigfatcanofworms
    
    Dec 1, 2021 at 11:07 pm
    
    Yes. I listened to an interview with Helen MacDonald yesterday. It was from 2015 when her book H is for Hawk came out. Have you heard of it/her? I hadn’t. But she wrote this book about the extreme grief she suffered after the sudden death of her father. I must get hold of the book. Her way of grieving was to train a goshawk. The book sounds amazing. Here’s the interview.
    
    https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/conversations/helen-macdonald:-grief-and-a-hawk/7788480
    
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    1. Misky
      
      Dec 1, 2021 at 11:13 pm
      
      I started writing poetry (years ago) to write myself out of extreme grief after my father died. I went to such a dark place that I never want to revisit it.
      
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    2. Misky
      
      Dec 2, 2021 at 9:09 pm
      
      I just listened to it. What an interesting woman! Thanks for the heads-up, W.
      
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      1. abigfatcanofworms
        
        Dec 2, 2021 at 9:54 pm
        
        Glad you listened to it. I wasn’t sure from what you wrote yesterday whether you felt it might trigger something in you. I thoroughly enjoyed the interview and I think I’ll keep an eye out for a copy of the book. Even just in speaking, I felt she had a lovely way with words.
        
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        Misky
        
        Dec 2, 2021 at 10:03 pm
        
        My dad passed away 15 years ago. I’ve settled in with that now. I feel joy, not loss, when I think about him now. I love him just as much today as when he was alive. But I think Helen is wrong about stages of grief.
        
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        abigfatcanofworms
        
        Dec 2, 2021 at 10:08 pm
        
        You felt them? I think she said she didn’t relate to them didn’t she? I guess everybody experiences grief differently. I haven’t experienced the loss of a parent yet. My most personal grief, I think, so far has been my mastectomy. It’s a weird thing to associate with grief, in a way.
        
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        Misky
        
        Dec 2, 2021 at 10:14 pm
        
        In hindsight I recognise them, yes. But I don’t think a person should focus on them while in the midst of grief. It can’t be rushed; it’s not logical. It’s a pit you have to climb out of … alone.
        
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