Abigail George- Three Poems

Abigail George studied film at the Newtown Film and Television School in Johannesburg. She is widely published from Nigeria to Finland, New Delhi, India to Istanbul, Turkey. She is a blogger, essayist, poet, and fiction writer. Some of her poems have appeared and are forthcoming in Birds Piled Loosely, Brittle Paper, Hamilton Stone Review, The Writing Disorder, Vigil Pub Mag. Her fiction 'Wash Away My Sins' was nominated for the Pushcart Prize. 'Feeding the Beasts' (2012) her second poetry collection was launched at the Grahamstown Arts Festival. She is the recipient of grants from the National Arts Council, Johannesburg, the Centre for the Book, Cape Town, and ECPACC (Eastern Cape Provincial Arts and Culture Council), East London.


The wedding day

Me longing for this visionary day.
Me waiting for this man
to show up and
get this party started.
Me getting married.
Getting ‘hitched’ in a summer of love.
In an intimate setting
in a chapel or a church
that can only seat so
many family and friends.
Ring on my finger.
Saying those vows.
In sickness and in health.
Until death do us part.
Making promises I know
I won’t be able to keep.
Me holding a wedding bouquet.
Given away by my father.
All the flowers in
the church, the hall

clouds of white lilies, roses, or orchids.
Not on your life.
Not on your life.
In the background a mountain’s green landscape.
The wedding photographer
a film student.
Me taking to the dance
floor in his, my shiny new
husband’s arms.
Cutting the wedding cake.
Only in my dreams.
I play it out in my head
like a mixed tape masterpiece.
Like I’m in high school
again reading a sonnet
out loud in English class
absent-minded. Adrift.
Thoughts like branches looking
for a vein.



Sign language

Emergency,
you know me better than anyone.
If I wanted to write
a poem about humanity
I could erase the sound
of crying but this is not
one of those poems.
Perhaps this is a poem
about chronic illness.
How devastating it is.
That there is a lack of
understanding out there

about it. I could go on
and on. The stillness is
frost blessing the ground
You walk upon.
It’s manna. The magic
and comfort of rituals.
You're light. You're
squelching footprints everywhere.
Etched into the unknown.
Etched into lines of sand. The talent of
the wind swept and mingling

in my hair. Oozing beads while the day roars into
being. The sea is a bubble
of mischief.  Poetry.
Innocent. The ghost
of the day glistening.
You’re all wrong for
tender me but I am right
for you. I am right for
your cold and tired boots. I know what
spirit is. It’s the holy ghost.
It’s the face of love.



How do I look Virginia Woolf

At the end of the world
And in the feast of his eyes
they are stained glass windows. He’s a
director of films. His
shirt smells of expensive
Cologne, driftwood,
smoke. The character
of a man. I wonder if
his eyes are still stained glass windows.
It’s the birth of the day.
Carrie Underwood sings
with a Southern drawl
that we’re still young
and beautiful. My body
is quiet and so are my limbs. My
heart is no longer a drum that beats
for yours in return

Your excitement is a palpable
mechanism.
You’re such an original.
You’re a sea of mocking.
Where to go from here.
Under water I am fluid.
Men and women sleep here. They’re safe, here.
It’s Paris in the spring for them.
The climate is precious.
We have to be careful.
I find myself in a desert.
I swallow the horizon,
The bird, the broken, the swimming
pool. Sunlight.