seeing it
19, 20 october 2020
riverside
waking,
dangled
handle of the
latch on the
french doors
like a moth on
the white painted
wood,
through glass
the estuary
in night,
the body
of its stillness
like the lover
you have bet
everything upon
to be within
her reach,
shore lights
holding steady
downward,
dreams that
barely tremble
her in breaking
on her sleep,
frilled
call
of the magpie
brushes
across her
throat
as she
turns
toward
you
then,
standing
into dawn,
showers
in
birdsong
drops of it
clamouring
down
her skin
Copyright © 2021 Peter Le Baige. All Rights Reserved
The music is from Prelude No. 6 of Chopin’s 24 Preludes, Opus 28, in a performance here by Yuja Wang at Teatro La Fenice in Venice in 2017.
Ruru ki Te Ruru 
reminds me a little of those upside down, floating across the city sky paintings of Chagall. The magpie is perfectly placed here to bring that half light scene into feeling
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Hi Dean, thanks for that, and for the nod to the magpie, a favourite denizen of this shore!
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Beautiful poem.
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Many thanks for reading, James!
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