<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Ways of Falling<\/strong><\/p>\n I<\/em> The friction of my hands tripping down the chains lifted the scent and landing, I stared up at swing\u2019s A frame, made pictures from its acne of rust as them out of my mouth in a shower of magma and stones. a savoy cabbage planted in my chest with a detonator inside. II<\/em> but it\u2019s a given each word will struggle and flail. Sometimes and their mouths gasp as I lift them clear, my line hooked hard in their soft fish lips. marble eyes watching a Tuesday-blue sky as I count and there\u2019s always a little blood and it me who falls backwards <\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n Claire Dyer<\/strong>\u2019s\u00a0 poetry collection, Eleven\u00a0 Rooms<\/em>, is published by Two Rivers Press. Her novels, The Moment<\/em> and The Perfect Affair<\/em>, and her short story, Falling\u00a0 for Gatsby<\/em>, are published by Quercus. Claire is undertaking an MA in Poetry at Royal Holloway.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Ways of Falling I Age five and slipping off the blue metal swing out back at 13 Marlyns Drive, it was a given the soil would be concrete-hard and Copydex\u2019d with dead grass. The friction of my hands tripping down the chains lifted the scent of hot offal into the air and made […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","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-8191","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-prose-poetry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8191","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=8191"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8191\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8194,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8191\/revisions\/8194"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nAge five and slipping off the blue metal swing out back at 13 Marlyns Drive,
\nit was a given the soil would be concrete-hard and Copydex\u2019d with dead grass.<\/p>\n
\nof hot offal into the air and made the sound of trains<\/p>\n
\nlayers of the earth travelled through my bones until I vomited<\/p>\n
\nI could not move and was, it seemed, thigh-deep in lava and shingle,<\/p>\n
\nI remember counting while waiting for the tingle, for it to explode.<\/p>\n
\nNow I fish in the back room of my house and count and wait.
\nThere is friction and track-rattle and I brace,<\/p>\n
\nthe sun thwacks against their scales, there\u2019s a hint of phosphorescence<\/p>\n
\nI watch them slap the dry grasses, their fish slime drying slowly,<\/p>\n
\nand wait for them to die. Sometimes sirens sound on London Road<\/p>\n
\nand the ground cracks daily, the ground cracks daily.<\/p>\n