Nadezhda Macey
Sestina I
I come back unchanged
Table grapes still rot over the veranda
The wasps taking their sweet time
And spilling forth like an eager lover the river will not wait
Eels, soft like wet algae or meat
Swim their soft curls of goodbye.
At the party we kiss their cheeks goodbye
Leave together early and short-changed
Bodies kept cold like pieces of meat
Smoking on the steps of the veranda.
Red light spills onto your face, we wait
For the Uber, you tell me now is not the time.
The bonfire is big and muddy sparkling in time
With the murmur of the river as we say goodbye
To summer. The burn takes hours we wait
Watching the trees, only one changed
Burning red amongst the evergreens hugging the veranda.
Blood burns juicy from your hands, don’t you like fresh meat?
A lamb spits fat above the flames but I don’t eat meat
You say your family will see in time
That this is not so bad. On the veranda
Everyone sits with plates of grease and you kiss me goodbye
With oily lips. I go home, get changed
Colour my eyes and nails dark, now wait
Still like a stone to dry. I get a little fucked up as I wait
For you, walking towards me holding flowers that smell like meat
Easter orchid blooming, death on your mind. You are changed
And so will I with the seasons. In time
We’ll see different summers, you’ll leave me on read as goodbye.
Already, we begin the untwisting. I am the veranda
You are the house. We walk up a flat’s veranda
You want me to apologise but it will be a long wait.
I blow soft vapour in your face, peach ice. Said goodbye
To healthy lungs long ago, can feel the rotting meat
Deep under my ribs. A pūriri moth lives one day in time
But curls five years in a chosen tree, becoming changed.
We too are changed, standing on the veranda.
Time flows and turning with the skies the river will not wait
Summer mud holds like meat under our feet. This is no soft goodbye.
Rita Angus / Shakshuka
You text me
that the crisp yellow
the hills and the light
brought a tear to your eye
it was like a Rita Angus painting
I text you
that shakshuka was so good
You are so nice with your unbought tulips
your open morning face
my lilies dying on your desk
At the door
hands full of cans and post-it notes
a bird and a smile in your teeth
‘Why do you like me?
I don’t know why I like you’
It’s the Instagram reels of pasta
cornbread lemon posset
cream, sugar, lemon juice pulling me to you
It’ll be okay at the end of this
we’ll have played cards and eaten well
at nice restaurants for cheap
The shower and the fridge door broken
top of Bell Rd and the city view
It’ll all be okay cos
you’ll still be as lovely as you always were
just one year closer to a law degree
I’ll be somewhere further than you think
or closer
to a room we’re both in and dancing
Nadezhda Macey (she/her) is from Te Whanganui-a-Tara, currently studying in Lyon, France. She misses living by the sea, but walking by the metropolitan river is good too.