The Presence Of A Past Between Them Poem by L.B. Temuco

He can sense the intimacy between them
the presence of a past between them
some of the bones of which have not yet turned to dust
he knows that she will not be able to resist
she has not been come for to be collected
but just to be kept

He wants to touch her hand under the table
to say 'come along with me for as far as we can go'
before the snow gets too deep
before the rose lays itself down to sleep
before the comets become opaque and lost

There was joy in her voice
when she answered the phone
he had imagined her lips
a circle around light and honey

He has no right to this he knows

He gazes at her in the thin light
his eyes often fail him with their imprecision
their lack of attentiveness
but not tonight
they are afraid of nothing

She makes everything pause around her

He does not have words to measure her
to calculate her grace
he knows that you do not have to take things to pieces
to know things

In her black dress
her body arches itself
the long lithesome neck of a swan
when once she turns her face to him
to say she is happy
she is a dynasty
a vase
the pale porcelain purity
of her face
cast and glazed in some deep place

He closes his eyes
and tastes all the ripened sun
of her skin

She empties everything around her
absorbs him
until he sinks beneath the waves of her
carried away
by the tides of her timeless limbs

He cannot measure
how far she has come