the staring game

a love poem about a staring game between children.

Unbearable green (the staring game, no. 2)

If you sat with her long enough
you could almost taste the summer –
how it dissolved on your tongue like a communion wafer –
absolute and final.

If you sat in the dappled shade of the linden, you’d soon find yourself
lost in the unbearable green of her eyes reflecting back the tree leaves,
dragonfly iridescent at the outer-ring clinging to yellow sunbursts that emanate from full-stops at each iris.

And if you allowed yourself to get lost in some childhood staring game
to see who would break first - she or you. And if you sat like this – en face,
and each dot was yours for a while, Episcopal and pure

And if the day was hot and ripe, you might find yourself leaning forward
– barely perceptibly -
Just enough to catch the scent of her humid damp-skin where hair meets neck.
You might find yourself wanting and wanting and wanting.

And all pf this witnessed through a window by the Nanny who shakes her curls
in such French and furious disapproval!

Such grown-up envelope over childish delight.


s.r.p.