Last year, I attended an online poetry workshop hosted by the great poet Lemn Sissay. We were set a task to create a poem with a particular structure beginning with “You’re the”….

It was meant for someone or something we either loved or hated; an expression to them from deep inside the heart.

Here’s mine. Each line represents a shared experience. It was sent to the subject, by the way, and received as well as was hoped. I wanted to save it here, just in case it’s immediately lost into the dust.

~~~

The tree, the lizard, and the lyrebird.

You’re the tree of all our secrets
You’re the glass held to my lips
You’re the panic of the python
You’re the wine she never sips

You’re the golden of the bower
You’re the butterfly on my wrist
You’re the silence of the fireflies
You’re the lizard in the mist

You’re the painting of the dipper
You’re the rosella of my words
You’re the keeper of our mothers
You’re the guardian of their birds

You’re my lyrebird of the shadows
You’re my orchid on the tongues
You’re my wildfires of uncertainty
You’re the red-smoke in my lungs

~~~