The Poet

By Sandra Arnold

Walrus-like he slumps
in the shadows of the rocks
flickering fire
into a flaccid belly.
She doesn’t see the pelican chin
or hair too thin to be so evenly raven.
Only his eyes refracting the stars
and the moon’s reflection in fragments on the sea.
You fuck divinely he complains. So it must be the wine
or the cold sea wind that renders me unimpressive
for I was never impotent till my wife asked for a baby.
She weeps
then comb my hair with spiraled shells
and sweeten the night air with love songs
and the eloquence
of your verse.

         
Sandra Arnold’s third novel, Ash, (Mākaro Press, NZ) and her first flash fiction collection, Soul Etchings, (Retreat West Books, UK) will be out in 2019.