Boots from Canada

I sleep softly on fire in a city that knows your footsteps from time to time      Our bones slip into each other      My bones slip into your honey-milk hands that are framed by the brown couch in the lounge room   You look like home     We sit on the couch and it cradles the shy-love-lust and your brown-cow eyes bore into mine    Several cups of tea and wine entertain our hands until the glasses and mugs are dry     I blink and you're still staring and I'm not sure of what to say so I tell you everything except for what I want to     I don't know how to interpret any more than the back of your hands     You're gone now     And before you went we said goodbye     A cold porch under my bedroom-feet and you in boots from Canada    And I wanted to raise my voice to bridge the distance but I realised that you speak only in whispers     So I'm here on this bed that you passed by once     I'm here on this bed with bones and a bare mattress in a crowded city that you once drifted through

Allison Browning