Janette Ayachi

Poetry Library

I first met your poet’s stare at a book fair
where you were selling copies
of your last book, promoting the next one
with leaflets and rain-stained smiles,
I wanted to stop at your stall
even speak to you but I was nervous,
though later you appeared beside me
in the dimly lit aisle of poetry where
I was dreaming of hawthorn blossom
and you were scanning the shelves
halting your gaze as if each book
was a familiar painting
holding your pen like a cigarette.
You whispered an apology
because you felt you cornered me
as I stepped back against the wall
to let you grasp the book
you were hunting with flapping wrists.
I was pregnant, in full bloom
you smiled like you understood
my cumbersome step, woman to woman
our secrets sewn in to the unknown.
The following week I read your new poetry
curious to discover more about you
I bathed in the submerging light
of your words and soaked
in the reflective bubbles of your voice.
Today you pass me with your daughter
shadows hatch behind
your unfaltering calm
the child once within me
now two weeks welcomed
in to a world where luteous leaves
descend and my body is sensing
its old formations
the circumnavigation of flight
and longing.

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