Chronicles 2012 (1)

We wait, steady on the tarmac
watching others come in
They look so fragile on the wing
dipping and swaying lower
last minute adjustments
as the ground rushes up
to touch in a cough of smoke

Now we inch forward
turning from the land
and then the rush, the gravity
My belly is feathery, fluttering
the power catches my breath
Up, up, impossibly airborne
on wings of metal and wire
weighted with scraps of our lives

My attendants are both men
one beautiful and shiny, lovely
but his soft edges, a lilt to
the voice and hips, a slick
of lipgloss betray his allegiance
The other is sculpted in face
his hair rising to a peak
an accent, pale eyes, a smile
for the ladies. A set to his
mouth reminiscent of a smirk.
He's not my cup of tea
---- though he serves me a coffee
(it's airplane coffee, watery
with a dribble of milk
but it induces a sense of
working towards wakefulness)

Two women a row behind me
laugh the same laugh, in sync
once, twice, peals like waves
a man is the cause I'm sure
I smile to myself and the window

Dream for my brother

They were coming for you
a They we only knew to run from
I never questioned that I would aid you
I never asked what you had done

I gave you a car to go from us faster
a car that wasn't mine to give
it was the colour of courage
I gave you the colour of strength

when you veered off the highway
the car you drove was white
the colour of beginning, or of death
now wedged in a crack in the earth

I crawled through the wreckage
crumpled at both ends like paper
gathering up your abandoned keys
fat bunches of keys to everything

brother, where are you running to?
do you know what you left behind?
your gods cannot love you as I do
follow them, but take your keys

(2011)

How to kiss me for the first time

Slowly. Gently. Sweetly. Subtly. With anticipation and a touch of reverence. As if there's nowhere else to be, no goal or destination, just this moment. Just the faint stirrings of desires to come.

Kiss me like Amelie and Nino. Start somewhere else. Not the back of my hand, which tells me you fancy yourself a ladies man. Not my neck, which speaks of the intention to arouse. Not a peck on the cheek, which feels brotherly, chaste, sheepish.

Start at the top of my cheek, the line of my jaw, my temple, the corner of my mouth. Linger, press your cheek against mine, skim your lips over my eyelids. Appreciatively, savouring.

Sensitively, reading my responses, noticing your own. Curb the impulse to rush in. Wait. Linger. As if you've wanted to for a long time, and can't quite believe it is happening.

With hands light on my waist, or in the small of my back, or holding mine. Holding but not trapping me.

Hold my face gently. Perhaps to turn me so that you can reach the other side, a nudge to turn my face up towards you, to cradle me when you finally reach my mouth.

Then gradually, as if you are holding back a dam of desire. As if, bit by bit, yielding to irresistible temptation. Our desires feeding off the desire of the other. Bodies leaning inexorably closer. With pauses and hesitation, easing into each other, seeking in increments.

So that, when it ends, my outward breath says 'yes'.