Night.

Day 22: Night.

You're afraid of the dark, but I feel safe in it. Night is when it is quiet and still. You're hidden in shadows and the possibilities of danger are thrilling, because they can't touch you. Blankets and windows and locked doors protect you, yet you still have the luxury of looking out of your window and seeing it all - the sky, the streets, the distant rush of cars. The night keeps its distance. It knows where your private space is. It does not overstep the sphere which you have marked around yourself.

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Words, Wide Night*

Somewhere on the other side of this wide night

and the distance between us, I am thinking of you.

The room is turning slowly away from the moon.

This is pleasurable. Or shall I cross that out and say

it is sad? In one of the senses I singing

an impossible song of desire that you cannot hear.

La lala la. See? I close my eyes and imagine

the dark hills I would have to cross

to reach you. For I am in love with you and this

is what it is like or what it is like in words.

Every time I read this there I feel sad and full of love and longing for someone. It stings, like it's the first read. The impossible tense of 'I singing' is extremely clever writing of which I envy and admire. I loved studying Carol Ann Duffy at A level and her work still inspires me.

*by Carol Ann Duffy. Taken from Carol Ann Duffy's Selected Poems. (London: Penguin Group, 2006) p. 86.