Mouth Piece

__________
"How did you get on with your man"
says she at the kitchen table - rolling a cigarette -
this woman who has minded and held and picked up after for me for 48 hours.
She is referring to a gentleman caller I had the evening before.
"Grand" says I and allude to the fact that I am alternately numb or high,
and that he probably wanted to see for himself whether I was falling around the roads or ready to hurl myself over the quay.
I am neither.
I tell her that he said to keep going,
no matter what, 
and to keep writing.........
 as I am her voice.
Her voice.
I am trying to put a hundred things in a bag,
so I can finally leave the building,
spinning in a circle in the permanently dark kitchen,
wondering where the hell anything is in this ship of a house.
It's a big ask - I tell her - finding the phone charger with the tiny teeth marks in the socket.
How much more can I write? I ask.
Can I tell the absolute truth about this?
I am high and speeding,
still racing on the adrenalin of the previous week,
head spinning, body aching, eyes swollen
and yet strangely at peace.
I have felt Siobhán around me and beside me in the last days more than I ever felt the lingering physicality of her in the massive chair, as if the separation were entirely through the metal panel.
She licks the paper and adds a filter.
"You know you can do this" she says as she flicks the lighter
and curls her lip around the smoke to talk.
"She would want you to".
And I look at the wall.
And I see the light on the photo..............
orange and purple and vivid,
and it drops from an eye,
across my cheek,
and then to lips,
and then it stays.............
"hand me the phone" I whisper and we look together
there is no light, 
no reflection, 
no prism, 
no mirror,
 we wave our hands, 
and stand in the way, 
and look at the ceiling,
and still it stays
and for a moment in my own eyes,
I see Siobhán look back at me and smile,
and I take the photos,
 23 of them over 4 minutes,
and the tears that had stopped came again,
as the woman whispers,
"She's telling you to be her voice"
and a tear drops from an eye,
across my cheek,
and then to lips,
and then I smile.

MDM Feb 2015