I am about to do something bodacious
Barefoot in the yard, eating a slice of buttered toast, I feel a tremor
in my bones.
Usually, I am full of plans, but not today.
I cannot picture the future.
I am carried along
by the sensation
that I am about to do something bodacious.
All through the following hours
I show a readiness that is mistaken
for courage. People come and go asking,
what went wrong?
I describe events as they happened,
list the damage.
I try not to roll my eyes.
I turn the pages of self-help guides (with illustrations).
I study the shortest routes to inaccessible
mountain summits. Staring at my hands
and thinking,
I’m stuck, I’m stuck,
is the surest way to get me killed, so says
one savvy rock climber. The sky above
is her banner, leading her forward.
David Belcher lives on the north coast of Wales. His work has been published in magazines and online journals. He reads and writes poetry pretty much every day. It’s becoming a problem.