Poetry

The split-palm steeple: a confession

I like you best with smear of jam on cheek
(to be married by the hair strands)
A raspberry line that bends with the unripe croaks of daybreak
asking if I have watered our prayer plant:

‘It is quenched’ I say,
though by my touch
and not the can.

The velvet veins,
whisping in moonlight
crying out for soft strokes.

Back and forth,
petiole postulate—
The soiree and sway,

your lips at
the dinner table
pushed out as if the air is a magnet repelled by the sun-split hour

So hush,
(please rob them of ornament)
and place, (honest now)
like the velvet
one
upon our mantelpiece, one leaf
crumbled*

*An accidental hoover suck, my sincerest apologies

Evie Wilson