CROP

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