I will not become one. I am hanging on.

I am hanging on. I am hanging on.

Whispers from above me. From above me whispers gather

The cliff ledge lined with edgy people of all colours

Some humming ‘Amazing Grace’, others simply staring.

Some I saw pointing at my back and wincing.

A bearded man with his hand on a bible or a red book or a white book

Or a leather book or a revolutionary book or a dark green book

Shouted down to me in sermonic tones deeper than the sea,

‘Let go. In the name of God. Let go!!’

A nervous follower peeps down and offers the advice that

‘There’s someone down there, they’ll catch you.’

And before I get chance to answer they erupt into a sky shattering

‘Someone’s Crying, Lord – Let Go. Someone’s Crying, Lord – Let Go.’

The harmony of those collected voices woke the spirit of the sky.

And they threw crosses at me. It’s raining crosses.

I look down past my feet – a devil or a god

A man the size of a pea is mouthing the words ‘Let go’.

Night-time was approaching. Breathless I whispered.

I will not fall. Never have. Never will. Not fall. Not fall.

But as quick as they came to help is as quick as they were gone.

But I am hanging on. I am hanging on. I am hanging on.

Darkness cloaked the horror of night-time,

Of gangrenous spirits that fed upon open wounds.

As lightning struck I saw glimpses of their faces;

Demons whose countenance had slipped;

Whose fingers had stretched and nails had curled;

Whose breath stank so viciously that I spewed to the sea

(My mantra: I am hanging on, I am hanging on, I am hanging on)

Throughout the darkness and fear until sunrise. And the stillness of

Morning breaking. I was a silhouette hanging from a branch

Against the chalky cliff. Only the sound of my trickling blood,

My breaking back and the moaning sky for comfort.

My shadow stretching across the cliff like a script title

On handmade paper.

The sulking storm retreated into the horizon to recollect –

Even the sea is trying to throw off its reflection.

I listened more, to the tearing of my back flesh as I hang,

The flapping wet skin of my bloodied back as it hangs

Tears painted salt veins along my ebonised skin.

As that stark sunlight skidded across a bloodied sky

I sensed the presence of two symmetrical shadows descending.

They stretched, seemingly even pushing back the clouds.

I felt them push warm air into my face.

I saw them in the corner of each eye. Magnificent wings

And felt the new muscles of my back and my chest expand with air.

Further and further. New air. New spirit. And there with not a soul around me

I unpeeled my tender fingers from that dew-drenched branch;