taking flight

we revelled in the cold autumn rain
that pattered all night through our open
bedroom window:
the lime taste of oxygen

but suddenly the sky
sweeps in from Meknes
spreads blue hot chalk over
god-forsaken Lisbon urburbs
the asphalt crawling with
gross fat black
glistening princess ants

princesses in life-and-death quests
for the promised life
the promised home
they were entitled to
blind to future
com
promises

they make me sick to the
bone
stick to my trousers, to the windshield
as I myself turn gradually into no
thing
boiling away on the
hot autumn asphalt

so in the stone blue distance
let us hide
in grounded old
aeroplanes
in the museum of flight
before I vanish for good

let me hide my hideous
shrinking head
in the warm Bedouin tent
of the gentle cup of your hands
where I know you will love me
as I grow senile
and evaporate

I love you for so much more
than this