A half-baked poem

This afternoon my Year 12 Literature class was working on an assessment task quietly and, in the final few minutes, having run out of marking to do at that moment, I scribbled down this poem. I’m sure it’s a long way from being a fully-fledged poem, but I quite like it and so am sharing it with you, for what it’s worth. I’ve tentatively called it “You Know What”, but am open to suggestions!

We can do this, though we haven’t tried lately:

The colliding of persons, concatenation of spirits,

The way that planets glide in complementary orbits,

Pulsing forces aiding each other’s motions.

We can do this, can’t we? You remember how,

 

The dog chasing its ragged bone and you,

Crestfallen, off your bike, heels in the air, while I

Collide with the wind pushed off your sandals

And weep because your knee-gash smarts

When I look at it too; and the sceptical gaze

 

Of the dog, who cares more for just one thing,

At each moment, than any other, and our spirits

Divided across places we’ve left and not known yet,

Across bodies we’ll soon lose. We can do this, you know,

Again and again – watch our memory-selves fall, glide, 

 

Now collide. You know how it goes,

For go it always does.