He stands
On plastic platform stages
That sit hundreds of people on weekend games.
Today, we’re the only bodies there.
The coral paint I’d smudged against his cheek
Is long gone,
But he smirked
As if he hadn’t rubbed it off.
And he smirked,
Dropping another coin
In one of my piggy bank lockers
Labelled with his name in bold black letters,
The piggy bank lockers
That fuelled the cyclist of my chest,
Pumping blood through the streets
That branch out through my body.
It pumps to by brain,
And I feel wings sprout from my plantation back,
But his butterfly wings
Flutter for someone else
In tighter jeans
And higher food chains,
And I am the dragonfly pest,
The kind farmers perfume with pesticide,
The kind kids lock up in a bottle,
The kind that kids don’t punch air holes for.
He stands
On his plastic platform stage
With the sun casting his shadow
Across the grass stadium lake.
My eyes wink at the sun,
And its orange gaze propels my shadow
Next to the one with bird’s nest hair
Our shadow selves swing with the clouds,
Hands centimetres away,
The way maple leaves never seem
To touch their neighbours.
I remember the chicken wishbone from last Easter,
And make my wish three months late,
But I’m still here,
As far from him
As the sand and the sea.
Ever touching,
Ever ebbing,
Never joining,
Only meeting.
And soon,
He’ll be standing
On foreign platform stages,
His shadow swinging
With another’s,
And I will believe
That wishbone wishes come true,
When the sea strand no longer separates white from blue.
YOU ARE READING
Cityscape
PoetryA collection of poems written in the city. Written for city folk who don't quite belong. And for everyone else who fall in between the cracks of 'here' and 'there.'
