the smell
of hotel soap on my hands -
this unsettled feeling

on my feet
I take a little dew
to work

casually
cutting into soft flesh -
avocado pear

I was falling
but someone caught me
and brought me
ever so gently
back down to earth

there is something
that I want, very much, to do
it might help
if I knew
what it was

This is not a tanka, but it may be a kyoka

an Asda bag
taken by the wind
higher and higher

my neighbour's
raised voice - you're not hearing

what I'm saying!

within the curl
of a leaf -
a small space

What I would do if... a tanka sequence

if I had wings
I would land
in a flurry of feathers
on your lawn
one sunset

when you
came to see
what caused the sound
I would gather you up
in a feathery embrace

I would
carry you away
over the hills
across the borders
to a land between

in a place so strange
a girl with wings
would come alive
because you could
believe in her

when I brought you
home
I would beat my wings
like birds do
when coming in to land

one year on -
no tan lines on my
ring finger

On losing hold of an angel's tail

It never lifted me
too high - an inch at the most
it was just a lightness
a welcome counterbalance
to relentless gravity



[Edited and much improved (I think) version. ]

the most casual
of gestures can betray
a tenderness
so strong it almost
pierces the heart