A Star That Danced

Don’t Touch Me

Cigarette paper skin Coats raw, eviscerated flesh The belly of the beast The search for Truth A song within a song Waiting for you, you Grind my bones and Sprinkle the ashes. Peel it back I am flayed You think it a game. Choked. Suffocation. Words on the wind mustn’t fly Birds on the wing Clipped, caged. Black oily gash Pure turned malevolent Perversion, submission. Ropes of…

Pull

I wandered lonely as

An orphan

Not a cloud, no dreams here

Little joy or jocund company

This is not a poem

There is no idyll

As soon as we had

Been there long enough

To put down roots

Up they were dug

Away we were taken

Somewhere new

No past, scant history

Prised away from soulmates

Wrenched apart from saviours

Torn

Abandoned

Floundering

We are not like them

Keep moving

Don’t you just love a…

Have you ever noticed as you edge through a crowd,

How they smirk and pontificate, voicing loud opinions?

They stand tall and spread wide

Unwilling to relinquish an inch.

We smile demurely and feign attention.

We cock an ear as they explain our specialties.

Wide-eyed, we nod as we hear our realities

Told through their privileged narrative.

Their repeat our history as if it were their own

While we…

Each life stage brings with it a mask.

A mask you will wear as you change and change again.

No subtle growth as you age.

We will label you, so we know who you are.

  First the girl, don’t play with the boy’s toys:

It’s not ladylike. No cartwheels in the park for you:

They’ll see your knickers. Of course the boys chase you:

That’s how they show that they like you.

No, don’t you do it. We don’t…

The girl knows

This is how it is for her.

This is her normal.

Others don’t understand.

Her parents love her,

They are just having a hard time.

  She knows it’s her fault.

They can’t help it.

Theirs is the tragedy.

Maybe if she is perfect,

And does everything right,

Just maybe, she can fix them.

  The woman sees

This is how it is now.

She completes him.

She is his ideal and perfect love.

He loves…

Tender lips, forcibly parted.

Too young, too soon.

Innocence shattered.

  Her fault, not his.

Her fault, it just is.

  Bruises on the psyche, enough to last a lifetime.

Recovery futile.

Forever broken.

  Wise beyond her years, broken inside.

Six candles blown out, the horror remains.

©Wild & Whirling Words

‘A Friend Like George’ is available now!

  Written and illustrated with love for all our children who struggle with sensory overload.

  ‘A Friend Like George’ is about a little boy at school who has autism and struggles with sensory overload. The other children in his class sometimes don’t understand why he is doing certain things such as getting upset with the noise or struggling to understand turn-taking. This book explains, in a…

Can't believe this was posted over two years ago. Thank you for all the amazing feedback and to all those who have been through it. Xxx

He must love me, he says he does.

He will be kind, he promises so.

He’s not controlling, he just wants the best for me.

He’s taking care of me, it’s for my own good.

He says I complete him, I never knew I had that power.

He doesn’t pursue other girls, he’s just looking.

He is traditional, I’ll be so happy as a housewife.

I’m doing it wrong, he will show me a better way.

I don’t look my best, he…

Coming soon….

In honour of #autismawarenessday on 2nd April @popadoodledesign and I are releasing our book ‘A Friend Like George’. It’s a book about friendship and the autism spectrum and how sometimes our friends can get a little overwhelmed at school. It shows what the teachers do to help and is designed to promote emotional literacy and understanding of the sensory difficulties many children face.

For every…

Out Of The Woods

Words like thorns snag and

Tear at my skin.

I pluck them out, examine each one

Between my finger and thumb. Flick.

Flick it away.

I stumble through moss- laden roots.

Rhizomes growing in rotten ground.  Feeding on

Dysfunction and fear. Toxic.

Crush it down.

Constant judgement.

Wide trunks feed the paranoia.

Suspicion needs no sunshine to grow.

  I can’t breathe.

The branches reach for my face.

It…

The Price To Pay

Mary’s hands tremble as she approaches the front of the church. Her delicate fingers clumsily grip the handles of her brown leather handbag and the heels of her mary-jane shoes echo around the nave. She kneels slowly, graciously and accepts the thin wafer from the liver-spotted hand of Father Thomas.

“Grant, O Lord, what we have taken into our mouths may be received with a pure mind; as a…

The old man sighs as he regards the photograph. The wing-backed chair envelops him in memory and choices made so many years ago. Painful sights and sounds assault him as the present disappears and the past reawakens.    

He feels the cold air of Berlin in 1943. The cloak of oppression which had started so softly and insidiously. It crept up on them all. He hadn’t expected the backlash to be so…

I Never Knew You

I didn’t know you,

I didn’t name you,

I have no idea if your eyes were blue or green.

Were you a boy or a girl?

Would you have my button nose?

That dark brown hair?

I never held you,

There wasn’t time.

I never met you.

There wasn’t the chance.

But still I love you.

You left my body

But never my heart.

©️Peta Maria Slaney 2016

https://www.miscarriageassociation.org.uk/your-feelings/

Stepping Out Of The Shadows…

As some of you know, I’ve been writing under a pseudonym for many years but have recently decided to combine my accounts, step out of the shadows and write under my own name.

  In view of that, I have released a revised edition of The INFJ Anthology under my real name. If you haven’t read it yet, it’s currently half-price on Amazon so if you are a poetry and literature lover or you have a special…

The first proof copies of The Bradshaw Chronicles: Australian Adventure have arrived and are ready to be sent out to my lovely beta readers.

Then it will be time for rewrites and edits, before sending it off to the publishers.

Happy days 🙂

Golden child, wonder boy Grade A student Smiling face to the world “Don’t look any closer, all is well here”   Home is chaos. Sisyphus revived.   Parents’ confident. Siblings’ protector Family representative “Nothing to see here. Move along folks”   Punching bag. Scapegoat. World-weary. “I am worthless, pay me no heed”   Broken man. Caustic father. The cycle continues. Dysfunction reborn.

The Phoenix Rises will be an anthology of uplifting poetry on the theme of overcoming adversity. We all face many challenges, be they in our relationships, or to do with ill health, prejeudice, and depression to name just a few. This exciting new project is an opportunity to add your triumph over adversity to a collection of uplifting and strengthening poems. Open for submissions now. Deadline is…