stockings and skirts

what if I sang til my vocal chords broke

and I had nothing left but a whispery croak

and my fingers

til the day I died?

and if I shaved off all my hair, just to be free

of it? of them? what then?

and if I peeled off my clothes and left them

in a pile at the old stone wall

and lay in the sand with the tide

licking my ankles and reaching up

to kiss my bare curves as I married myself to the sun?

would you kiss me too?

what if I climbed into the highest tree

I could find,

with wings glued to my shoulder blades,

and refused to come down

for dinner?

or if I packed a suitcase full of shortbread biscuits,

stockings and skirts,

packed it full and dragged it out

to the bottom of the lane

and sat on it til the sun waned -

waiting?

would you bring tea for the biscuits?

what if you walked away from me and disappeared

like a phantom

to shape-shift into someone I never knew?

would bullets hurt you?

or words reach you?

or desperation draw you back to my arms?

would your features haunt me?

or the details taunt me?

- surprise attacks -

on a day I thought I had managed to forget you

- peppery bursts of 'friendly fire'

that take me out at the knees

it's okay

I guess I don't need my knees