Bare Hands: Departure Lounge

Bare Hands had a competition for poems and photos on the subject of Bare Hands!
This poem was Highly Commended and is on their website, which is full of intriguing poems and artwork - have a look! http://barehandscompetition2013.tumblr.com/

Departure Lounge

I’d tucked the last of our green figs

in a thermal mug in your hand luggage

with these fingers now linked

to your working hands

that fix things: locks on gates

the windsurf sail, the cistern.

They played on my skin this morning

teasing out tension

between my shoulder blades.

And your eyes that look

at all of me

and your tongue…

that time when I wept

with self-loathing

it licked the salt from the wound.

The queue for the check-in is long.

You tell me to go but I stay.

It’s hard to find conversation.

When you reach the corner of the stairs 

I text, ‘I missed you first.’