{"id":1564,"date":"2009-01-19T08:45:00","date_gmt":"2009-01-19T08:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ink.verticalplus.co.uk\/archive\/?p=1564"},"modified":"2009-01-19T08:45:00","modified_gmt":"2009-01-19T08:45:00","slug":"new-haibun-by-anne-brooke-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/new-haibun-by-anne-brooke-2\/","title":{"rendered":"New haibun by Anne Brooke"},"content":{"rendered":"

The secret smell of lemons<\/span>


The road before us darkens. The shadow of your body next to mine as we walk together. Only the rustle of the leaves. The breeze whispering me to safety might be the sound of your voice. Between us lie all the words we cannot say, although now and then our hands touch and drift apart in the rhythm of our journey.<\/span>

In your bright hand<\/span>
the secret smell of lemons,<\/span>
the taste of fresh spice.<\/span>

We drink. The walls and people around us are warm. The table is set apart. Somewhere to talk about things that are possible, swallow down like dust things that are not. You tell me of holidays, work colleagues, your new car. I talk of family, church, my unwritten novel. Under the lights, your skin is the moon in autumn framed by window bars.<\/span>

On your creamy skin<\/span>
the secret smell of lemons,<\/span>
the taste of warm spice.<\/span>

When the lights dim, you laugh, your eyes already shining with home. The bill is paid and the wide road beckons, colder now. Behind us the door shuts. Silence of night rolls over us again. We walk, saying little. At the turn to your flat, you hug me once and quickly, before the pathway folds you up. And I wonder how your tongue will taste.<\/span>

Under your tongue\u2019s heat<\/span>
the secret smell of lemons,<\/span>
the taste of wild spice.<\/span>


* Anne Brooke still lives in Surrey but suspects she will be asked to leave soon. Whilst in hiding, she can be found at <\/span>www.annebrooke.com<\/a> which also includes details of her latest crime novel <\/span>Maloney's Law<\/span>.<\/span>

<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The secret smell of lemonsThe road before us darkens. The shadow of your body next to mine as we walk together. Only the rustle of the leaves. The breeze whispering me to safety might be the sound of your voice. Between us lie all the words we cannot say, although now and then our hands […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1564","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-haibun-tanka-haiku-haiga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1564\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inksweatandtears.co.uk\/archive\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}