Emma Neale
Taste
Vita exits a taxi.
A spark released from coal
or petals pushed from a black bud sheath:
her fine-tulle skirt
satsuma-orange,
chrysanthemum, tangelo, gerbera, marigold...
a flash of tropical in the storm,
she runs up the gallery steps in the rain.
Later, tells us that night she dreamed a coughing fit:
Rita Angus paintings leapt from her mouth,
eloquent palettes, bright, speechless balloons.
Which reminds Daniel to offer whisky.
Hot honeyed apple, with a sting,
or wild, smoke-swept, a campfire on the highlands,
or clover-spiced, peaty, malty?
Vita says, like her grandmother once,
“Mine tastes of bells rung under sea.”
Justin savours, swallows.
They tingle and hum beneath his tongue:
all his words, that want to cluster to her,
like bees to ink made of grenadine
or to the sweet, peeled skin
of mandarins, tangerines.
Page(s) 80
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