Quadira

You act like you knew, your carnation hangs but shines, the desert doesn't worry you, we go to meet the writers, my partner almost climbs, wears silk and linen finery, the palm trees are few, but after rain provide, drops of comfort as her due, nothing here to frighten, just the yellow signs, of a poet becoming excited, she wriggles to someone new, her laugh becomes delighted, 'it's no one she exudes', ‘she's really just the crew', 'come and make me wise', powdered with a smile of glue, we sip at lonely wine. at the rails pray, for something better than a headstone, could't stand the shame, from yesterday’s game, the ones off the labour, thunderstorm and showers again like a schooner waits for wind, she let us pause for thought the loss she created, her bottle a freighter, , she knew all our sins, cargo boats making for home, their freight caught, she jolted all our bones, knew where we lived, the Bridge her open shore, how we were as kids, at her party on the Falls, Belfast's steamy closeness, we were all her towers, never made to cowe