Photograph

Pose, click, inspect, click, swish
Time and image changed
Pose, pose, wait, smile too long
Now those smiles are so practised and so fleeting
Is that what I look like?
This thought can be deleted.
We all know what we look like, in these now fleeting moments of self-reflection.

© Isabel Hare
All rights reserved

Guitar

Hot place, there is loss in the air; dark lacy shadows; red wine – a bitter smell – a woman with bare shoulders, thin straps – at a cafe table – cigar smoke. Secrets.

Leaves scud along the cool stone tiles – dry, papery. Low voices – intense eyes. A betrayal. Footsteps echo. Outside it is light, bright – the sun is fierce – the chorus of crickets deafening – mountains in the distance, blue.

She leaves – lights her last cigarette – sits on a wall – paint peeling. Ready or not ready to begin the rest of her life.

He shrugs. Makes himself a cup of strong black coffee – in Hebrew they call it "botz" – mud.

Her seat is empty. She's left a memory of her perfume. He hears the heels of her strappy sandals recede into the blinding heat. He swallows the thick sour coffee which scours his throat.

Yet again – it is done. Finished.

Trapped in the burning spiral, he sits watching the waitress as she delivers the sweet cake to his table. Again, he plays music with her eyes, never giving up the weaving of his spell for a minute.

© Valerie Taylor

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