“Adrift” and Other Works by L. Rumble

Lucy Rumble is an emerging writer from Essex. Her poem ‘My Nan, Remembered’ won third place in the 2023 Tap Into Poetry contest, and her work has been published in Crow & Cross Keys, Schlock! Webzine, and Needle Poetry, among others. Find her on Instagram @lucyrumble.writes or online at lucy.smlr.uk

Adrift

Port tidin fares us well, dear,
We’ll reach Skegness ‘fore long.
‘Ere, don’t you get wound up again
And forget me moorings, mind.

I’M REMINDING you ol’ wander eye
To come back ‘ere ‘fore morn.
Don’t play no gossip game out there –
Remind ‘im I canny wait ‘ere long.

Ain’t nought pleasure for ye ‘ere lad,
When me moorings yet to come.
Ya know how a doll like me’ll get
When Mester Stoor Worm come.

Oh I din’t mean like that, dear,
Just that bobbin’ ain’t no fun.
I canny mind no piece o’ land
When I got us ‘ere all wrong.

Just don’t save me no souvenirs
And bring me moorings, mind.

Online and innocent
content warning: implied sexual violence

Movie-dolled up in pleated skirt,
thigh highs, and doe-y eyes.
Plump lips for the smearing.

Fingers run down china skin,
lurid flickering screen
murmured how soft, warm, lovely.

But she felt cold and less appetising.
She wasn’t yet –

muffled, caught in wool,
long drones impressed on neck.

Voice converged in scribbled mess,
fraught lines lurching forward and
ensnaring in her blackened tress.

They chew you up and spit you out
but got all the prepositions wrong.

Losing track, telling time by matted hair,
caressed when he was done.

Persephone is

caught between two screens,
replaying tangled seasons in
her tethering between worlds.

At once forgetting to breathe
and fogging up the mirrors
of her moored belongings.

Under the mist of moonlight,
her spirit mixes fruit in frost
and stars in the break of day.

She’s writhing in the ground

‘til suddenly her feet fall off
and her heart begins to fly.

The cheat’s a liar 
 
Envy’s cherry kisses drip 
from poison blossom lips.
 
My dearly diamond ache 
of queenly hearts is fake.
 
Pearly gates of devil town 
drown my teardrop face in 
chalice cups
                     
                   cuts are deep 
and mayhem buries us 
in this orchestrated cheat.

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