Tuesday, February 28, 2012

Tuesday Poem: Grounds for a Protection Order

I don’t unpack
my bags anymore
Ruamoko. I know
how volatile you are.
All day, all night
you devise
your next violation
your next vicious act.
Each night I lie awake
waiting your hammer
feeling your vice
tighten my heart
tracing the scars
you've carved on my life.

This is another in a sequence of Ruamoko (Earthquake God) poems I am writing. Keep an eye out for future Ruamoko poems on this blog and visit Tuesday Poem for more poems this week.

Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Dance lessons

I didn’t join the blue-dressed, barefoot girl
as she pranced alone upon her toes
at the after-wedding dance last Saturday
her male and female partners coming, going.
Neither did I sidle up beside the five men coalesced
each dancing self-obsessed with Saint Vitus
nor crib some space among the solo swayers
nor nudge aside the twos and threesomes.
But this odd menagerie of motion
led me to a dance floor long ago
where matrons with a record player
showed spotty boys and girls with sweaty palms
where to place their feet and hands
should a waltz be struck up by the band.


Funny how memories are triggered – anyone else experience the dance lessons of a previous age? I seem to remember they were pretty excruciating all round.

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