I have spent years falling out of each window by Julia Webb

I have spent years falling out of each window

the tall building of grief gave me.
Every day I climb to the top of the tower
and let myself fall again.

Even though I have tried to stop
feeling the guilt of the living,
the groove it runs in is too well worn.

Each night as I climb
the stairs of my grief,
I pause for breath at the midway point.

Each night I hope to meet the ghost
of a loved one coming back the other way.
But there’s only me and my breath.

I wonder what my dead would tell me
if I gave them voice
perhaps, burn the building down.

*

Julia Webb is a neurodivergent writer, editor and teacher (from a working class background) based in Norwich, UK. She has an MA in Creative Writing (poetry) from the University of East Anglia. She is a poetry editor for Lighthouse – a journal for new writers. She has three collections with Nine Arches Press: Bird Sisters (2016) Threat (2019) and The Telling (2022).