< Back to Contents

Amy Marguerite

let us wear the first impression


let me roll the reel
into a small heart-shaped
locket. let trauma recede
at the shutter. let the rain
be sun and day be night.
let every compound relish
its duality. let us lather in
many moments. let the men
be women. let every woman
stroll in the foreground.
let a temporary passing place
be a permanent residence.
let asymmetry be the rule
and regularity the exception.
let us be razed to life.
let our secrets be kept
at arm’s length. let the bay
window reveal multiple stories.
let layers of clothing and
conversation be equally elegant.
let us wear the first
impression.

Infidelity


I arrive at the berth
with your children.

The shallows whisper
sleep song into engine

ear. The boy shows me how
to anchor but I am too

tired to climb down
the bow. This water is so

limpid I am falling in
to a lucid dream just by

imagining it. We lug
our soggy bodies onto

public land. The children
swing on broken swings.

The broken grownups
drink their drinks.

Your husband crinkles
into the tarp, that single

vessel on his head
pulsing like the tiny clock

of an infant’s heart.
I imagine the rupture,

the division of mind
and matter, how painful

it would be if
he actually ran for you.

When you arrive
late with the baggage,

my feet make a triangle
shape around a starfish.

The girl etches angel
figures in the sand.

The grownups bury
their brokenness

in the overgrowth. You
pocket me in the thick

of it—somewhere
deep, somewhere damp,

somewhere quietly
excessive. I can only

begin to imagine
the rapture of this

distance
conditional

on a vision of what?
exactly.


Amy Marguerite (she/her) is a poet and essayist based in Tāmaki Makaurau. She completed an MA in Creative Writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters in 2022 and is currently working towards the publication of her debut poetry collection. Her writing can be found on Poetry Shelf, in journals such as Milly Magazine, Sweet Mammalian, Turbine|Kapohau and Symposia, and on her blog.