session in the woods. Someone took a feather
to the hairdressers. Gum cross-sectioned
my cheek; he forgot about removal to kiss.
Had to avoid tree roots, placed us on green.
He mentioned his bullied niece kept reaching
for her blanket; Mr. Smith is quaking regression,

but sunlight streaming in
through impractically curtainless windows;
my skin, made-up in golden light,
looking taught from affluence
and vitamins.

Like they do in films,

wait for the witch who comes to pick wild garlic.
Together we can be brave and
pull the green bits from her teeth.
Wandering the glen with
nothing in our pockets, we can search
for the place where fairies still live.
No one will find us there,
not even the old grey bell they ring at tea time.

I make broth, feel odd wiping it off your face
moments after swiping through bodies, preferences,
dates. Sunset-orange forget-me-nots mar the napkin cloth

Paysage Moralisé

There’s more to this three-foot square:
lilac vetch & vermilion
field-poppies, some sort of crucifer . . .

Brown limpets with tonsured heads
creeping over the fish-stink isle,
spongy underfoot, seaweed for grass.

Such stillness in the air. The attic window
is a cupped ear set to alert the house to subtle
shifts in atmosphere: auguries; signs; any tiny
notice of cataclysmic change. . .

      What Part of Me? Sun demands a front row seat above the graveyard through the trees when my mother’s placed in soil, surrounded by her friends’ small talk – She must have sent the rays for us. Women in their Sunday best, men in greying suits...

Land has dried its eyes, grown hard
hands and interrogates each arrival:
Where are you from, really from?