Dael Allison

city bars, a glass of decent red.

as inclined as anyone to the subtleties of juice

you argue the problem is not the fruit

but the feral kernel. leaning from a future

in an architectural paper bag

you sway, cannot be swayed, dig for light

one thought leading to another. journeyman

tropes restless in your head, craft

as strong as a leaf.

home slides to a different topography.

cobwebs for each return, a mud-dauber plug

in the keyhole, eggs cached in living

spiders, the termites’ implacable tick-tick

in stumps and walls. this is the place

to stretch limbs straight. walking on stilts

hands, clouds you follow wasp-drone

to where alien trees invade. the doppelganger

beautiful in every other way.

in this valley where the sun banks gold and flares

each concussion of pink, you are out with the chainsaw.

peach trees felled, wasps still droning

in the blossom.

Dael Allison edits and writes poetry and prose. Her poetry publications include Shock Aftershock and Wabi Sabi (Picaro Press 2010, 2013), and Fairweather’s Raft (Walleah Press 2012), a volume of poetry produced as the creative component of her Masters of Creative Arts, University of Technology Sydney, supervised by Martin Harrison.