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Counting Down<\/strong><\/p>\n 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 counting one <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Annie Pia<\/strong> returned to writing after a 30 year gap a year ago. She has published in Poetry Scotland<\/em> and Northwords Now Magazine<\/em> and one of her poems was chosen last year for the Stanza International Festival Masterclass. Annie is an active member of two Edinburgh-based writing groups, she has read at the Edinburgh Fringe and Shore Poets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Counting Down 10 counting ten the last bus is empty she wants to stay at least the lights are friendly and she can talk to the driver 9 counting nine a dark street nothing can frighten her now she watches the clouds treads quietly pinpoints the moon 8 counting eight again a lost […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4875","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4875","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4875"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4875\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4877,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4875\/revisions\/4877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4875"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4875"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4875"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\ncounting ten
\nthe last bus is empty
\nshe wants to stay
\nat least the lights are friendly
\nand she can talk to the driver<\/p>\n
\ncounting nine
\na dark street
\nnothing can frighten her now
\nshe watches the clouds
\ntreads quietly
\npinpoints the moon<\/p>\n
\ncounting eight
\nagain a lost key
\nhe answers the door
\nhello is awkward<\/p>\n
\ncounting seven
\nshe hangs her coat on the staircase
\nboth hover
\ngreen tea or red wine?
\nhow easy is it to sit in her own sitting room?<\/p>\n
\ncounting six
\nwho will she phone
\ntexting her children
\nraking up friends
\nscripting upbeat<\/p>\n
\ncounting five
\nshe fills crates
\na life’s journey writ in plastic,frames and gloss finish
\nmustn’t look
\nignore the ghosts
\na “good morning”..
\nthe postman….dogwalkers…people laughing
\nlaughing.<\/p>\n
\ncounting four
\nshe marks up property pages
\ndreams of….of not dreaming
\nof no more questions<\/p>\n
\ncounting three
\nrevising versions of self
\nwhen is tomorrow?
\nthis is the one time
\nshe must not listen to herself<\/p>\n
\ncounting two
\n\u201cwhy don’t you stand on our own feet…\u201d
\nher own feet can’t hold all of her
\ncan anyone?
\nShe moves closer to the corners of her home
\nwhispers her blue notes to its walls
\ngathers each room tenderly in the palm of her hand
\nwhere babies,teenagers and her mother slept once
\nand a suddenly ageing married woman lay awake
\nwanting more,wanting it all.<\/p>\n
\nshe considers the lives she didn\u2019t lead
\nloosens her grip…
\nstop.
\nGo now.<\/p>\n