Indecent Exposure

the bright green architecture

oscillates

to the pulse of family

                winter freezes its silverware

my vigilance         creaks

& a wind god

rushes in

stabs his spear into the weak eye

of a hung out to perform

             

                                      sun

                        

i’ve been accused of indecent exposure

i’ve made myself too obvious       goosebumps

texture          the earth’s        

fossil-fed layers of my skin

She’s Only Who She Is   

she blames the weather     the heat

fits awkwardly into this picture    

of beaches     paddocks

riverbanks     she speaks

of silences

of instincts which initiate      which

clot the blood    

*

she imagines

taking apricots from trees     grapes

from a trellis     the morning’s dark

treacle from the sun 

the woman hunts

for goats & rabbits     she comes

fierce-eyed     bordering

on the mystical     she grabs

at a fistful

of childhood pieces

she’s only who she is     picking up

sounds of distant harmonies

*

later     she will dig a trench for the moon

   

to sleep in

Iain Britton is a Te Whanganui-a-Tara/Wellington poet and author of several poetry collections. His work has been nominated in the UK for a Forward Prize for Best Single Poem and Best First Collection. Poems have been published in such magazines as Harvard Review, Poetry Magazine, The New York Times, Landfall, brief, Stand, Agenda and the New Statesman. THE INTAGLIO POEMS was published by Hesterglock Press 2017. A new chapbook - Project Constellation - was launched this year by the London publisher Sampson Low.