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Post Diary Blues

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This melancholy fug
burrows into my bones
After delving back again
into those memories recounted
with such forensic clarity
Comes a cold blue atmosphere
a fragrant longing
and precision-tooled regret

Those searingly stark lines
old faces, wild flames
lost friendships resurrected 
I’m dropped back into the thick of things
Drifting through teenage streets
old freedoms, vintage fantasies
and all those confusions
I could now straighten out so easily

The many story threads left dangling
friendships brutally truncated 
as people moved away to university
or were scattered as dandelion seeds
whisked across the globe
some blown beyond this life
I’d love to call them up 
and chat for hours again

It’s a temporary sadness
thin blue tendrils grip my heart
As I mourn it all together
the loss of those faces
and that old way of living
The people we once were
they still exist in stasis
trapped inside my dusty diary

My head swims through all the memories
out of time, for a little while 
Arriving home, I’m calmed again
warmed and thawed by the place I live 
That loving smile that greets me
as the kitten mews for my attention
the past is passed and left behind
a stepping stone to the beauty of now…
 

[2023]

Bit niche this one, but if you’ve ever gone down the rabbit hole of re-reading old diaries you might find yourself momentarily disconnected from reality!

🌷(7)

diaryfriendshiptimereadingfug

◄ Character Reference

On Henrietta Street ►

Comments

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Tom

Wed 6th Dec 2023 10:48

Thank you Tim, Keith and Stephen. I'm glad it got you thinking about your own experiences. Every few (weirdly, seems to be around 7) years, I somehow stumble across my old diaries and decide to have a peek - and soon myself sucked in and reading them for days and am left feeling rather strange afterwards. Thought this feeling deserved a poem...

Thanks also to Greg, Frederick, Holden, Hugh and Manish for the likes 😃

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Stephen Atkinson

Mon 4th Dec 2023 16:59

Wonderful stuff, Tom. Worth many a re-read! 👏

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keith jeffries

Mon 4th Dec 2023 16:33

Tom,
This is one of your best. The third stanza is glorious in the way you use the language of expression. I have kept a diary (a page a day) for close on fifty years. Seldom do I read what is contained in these volumes but when I have, I become immersed in melancholy, regret and somewhat alarmed by the passage of time. Maintaining a diary is a useful tool for self discipline and a tool to assist any writer or poet in his work.
Thoroughly enjoyed this.
Thank you,
Keith

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Tim Higbee

Mon 4th Dec 2023 14:06

I thoroughly enjoyed this transformative depiction of a moment reminiscing the past. I caught the dangling thread and it immediately unraveled as I tumbled into my own rabbit hole of memories. I had to climb back out to finish the piece. Then read it again as a whole. Isn't it amazing how quickly that fug will fall upon us, anytime or anyplace.

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