And it makes me wonder what I’d say, if I could say all the things in my head, if I could give you all the images and moments, all the feelings, thoughts and words.
And if I could shape them, if I could form them out of the mist rolling in by your door, would you hold them, would you take them in your arms and keep them close?
I move as if unhindered by time, the mist rolls in, softening me, droplets of water around my words. And beyond the bustle, in the place that only we know, there is calm.
Look it’s fine, I just need sleep that’s all. It’s hot and I must stop dancing but part of me doesn’t care. Part of me gave up years ago and now there seems to be a final peeling, a revealing of what lies underneath, like scraping back the layers of muck on an old canvas to find the artist’s original intention.
And here it is, the painting in me now, bare foot and tired, swirling in imaginary skirts, beaming into the eyes I cannot see, shaking the memory of long hair towards my kitchen splash-back.
And through the old tiles he grins back, watches me dance as though we were born to be in this place, through the years of separated moments until this one. These seconds in a decaying universe where we come together and I spin like my cells depend on it, and they do.
The music spirals around me, I mirror the beat with my incessant rhythm, capricious, unleashed and released in my kitchen, in the tiles where he smiles back. And he watches. And I dance.
Janey L Foster 