Photo credit: Takahiro Taguchi
Come Back
By Emma Robertson
I can’t yet tell you it’s okay
dry eyes, flooding brain
You can’t yet tell me what you’re going through
so you look to me, and I stare blankly back at you
I try to understand what’s going on
but all I say in confidence is that it won’t last long
You ask me not to change
I yearn too hard for your old ways
so I start to dance because it makes you laugh
and for a moment, it’s like the old days
I want to feed you all my energy
but you’re only hungry for my consistency
and not my numbing tricks.
Only then I start to realise,
‘Perhaps this isn’t something I can fix’
Now my eyes are growing wetter
because I suppose you’re right:
Feeling less won’t make you feel any better.
Photo credit: Hieu Le
Warm Memory i.
By Emma Robertson
soft hair chokes my ears
rosy lobes drowning in sweaty locks
gentle stares crescendo to glowing hugs
tourist fingers on my homeland head
tangle the shorter strands, north of my neck
my tailbone tingles
my fingers fizz
cradled by the mattress, my cheek rests on another’s jeans
quiet friction on dark-wash denim
a background silence
a silence not empty, but not substantial enough to be noticed
simply absorbed by the plants
and the sandy shoes in the corner
a foreground noise
a noise composed of vibrations that echo between the three lovers
reflected on each other’s eyes
and read by our lips
the old spaghetti-scented air, with every breath
delivers a spaghetti-scented love note
an inhale, an exhale
a sensual exchange of pasta-perfumed happiness
sore bones,
joint cramps
cushioned by two foreign pairs of trousered legs
against my own
the simplest form of contentment
reciprocated and relished
in the shape of an equilateral triangle
the friends exist in a triple harmony
platonic affection
kisses without contact
the moment lasts