Steps forward, by Devon Reiffer. Image courtesy of the artist
Staging a spectacle, from the hotel room
in Tokyo. You: lights out,
Me: ‘asleep’, pretending to be you,
You: sliding out to seize upon Tom
and cackling. You knew
Sluggath could get through any door,
which is why you kept your door
ajar, each night, regardless of the room—
a slip of light to warn off spiders who knew,
You knew, just how to find you out,
and the bugs and the bees, and Tom
or Dad, or Mum, catching them in cups for you
to stare at. They have a hoot, imagining you
in the jungle, giant creatures just behind the door—
I’m missing you. We’re doing fine, me and Tom
but it’s different with you gone—your room
is clean for once! the musty smell aired out
but apart from that the same. Who knew
anyone could feel this far away. Who knew
grapes (grapes?!) could make me think of you,
and how we no longer have to fight it out
for a fair share. But you have so many doors
to open—go open them! You don’t have room
in life or time to sit moping over poems—Tom
wouldn’t. Be more like Tom!
That freckled boy-turned-hobbit who always knew
from the off exactly what was what—no room
for exaggeration (so unlike me and you,
both known to blow things through the door,
to lose all proportion)—and I can’t get out
of my mind just how far out
of your shell you’ve come. The same girl who, with Tom
and I, played fairies: a hollow-trunked tree with no door
was their home till spring, when we knew
the birds would nest: oranged gullets stretched to you,
hatchlings fighting for space in their wood-and-straw room.
Tom watched a chick burst its membrane banks: it knew
that in the spasmed entry out the door of life
you needed practically no air, and very little room.
~ Liv Constable-Maxwell
Liv Constable-Maxwell is a third year English student at Oxford University. She is currently Fiction Editor of The ISIS Magazine, Founding Editor of the Jericho Arts Review, and Events Coordinator for Oxford Writers House. She ran weekly writing workshops for the Oxford University Poetry Society this year, and has written regularly for New Statesman magazine.
