NATALIE WILLENS

sunday

 

my hair

was like wheat, flaxen you told me.

your mole cast a thin shadow in the light seeping

through the still, cold air.

 

I always heard you chuckle after

you had turned your back

the smell of frankincense trailing out the room

after you

 

I was never sure you’d come back.

 

then you’d draw a bath, slipped

out of your dress before the bottoms

of your feet had cooled from the tiles

 

three drops of lavender

four drops of eucalyptus

it cleared my breath before I had time to check the heat

 

I dipped my pinky in

at first it was clear, cloudy like oils

whirling in a november hot spring

 

then pink, open

then deep

like falling

 

you said many men had touched you.

so I lay with steam rising,

waiting

for you to touch me