Beside, asleep, you wait
for summer through an open sash.
I stretch, unloose
a back that’s been on bended knee
lent over gooseberries.
Birdsong decorates the silence.
Fruit swells on last year’s shoots:
at a hand’s reach
its tartness yields to my caress.
Tingling from the hurtful thorns –
scratches, sweat and sunburn –
I drift into recollection
of long-since lovemaking.
How our necks, like jousting giraffe,
once collided.
How skin brushed against skin;
a palm placed at my waist, though now
your work-strong arms lie resting.
Even the coldest roots will warm,
unseen, when winter melts.
This is our time.
With sharpened blade, we prune bare limbs -
the damaged and dead wood.
Let fresh light bathe a tired heart.
ix. 2020
