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Photography: Sarah Reed
Raewyn Alexander

Raewyn Alexander writes novels, poetry and non-fiction, lately she tutors
world-wide online and also edits the literary annual, Magazine. The third
issue is due November 2005, subscriptions through
we spoke of foreign places

faces at the window in the dark
how some films make every house-creak into teeth
there's something that could swallow you

get into bed quick and covered - that's immunity

every morning the shadows that invaded our rooms
scoop away under the bed
where a forest grows around their stings
and the house creaks with laughter
since we've made the past sleep so fast

taught to safely catch danger alive
carried buckets full of stings to the forest
insects released there in kindness
a Buddhist priest she knew had that duty
when scorpions invaded their rooms

I have no idea why the tea cup matters more

when I mention the trespass order
but blue and white striped crockery takes an eye
conversation rolls to bargains found on roadsides
why I want anyone barred from my doorstep
that shatters because we dropped it

fireworks - and poets with teacher laughs
bright sparks squeal and blossom
we stand about on damp grass then
and that legal paper at home is folded not twisted
an unlikely spill to light any fires

the teenagers mock-worship sparklers on the lawn
bowing over and over in cackles at flares
I forget you exist for days at a time now
& amongst gunpowder and wine for Guy Fawkes
you are part of a benign nameless dark

I say things like that the way stewardesses chant safety
instructions before every flight and a mime of tugs
this shower of sparks through unknown space
the way a match may do that
strikes something and fuses too - or can snap

she looks like a feral cat

no fur nor slit eyes but through me
the way wild creatures know other windows
says she likes fighting

the criminal young popping
juice not yet wrung to a pulp
their ears and what people say

steel worn as jewellery
tattoos of birds on the wing
the literacy class has pearls too

nobody saved exactly more a sense of new battles
somebody left to bleed in a sentence
where a neat page absorbs black and blue

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