Sunday 7 November

I am always mid-gulp of fresh air and love poems
and so I understand that in any other story the
hothouse hike I take at the birth of November
would be leading me to you—and perhaps it still
is, and neither of us know yet; in which case, what
oncoming rapture—but: for the moment, in this
story, there is glorious living light dispersed rich and
heavy through the trees and my hair and these flowers,
the ones I spent $9.99 on after seeing them in a box
outside one of arguably-too-many corner-shops on
the same straight-down road. And they’re hard to carry,
just slightly, a bit awkward to hold, but a sweet joy
nonetheless bracketed in the crook of my arm—
and I, well, I have had practice at this; I am far
better attuned to wanting things than I have ever
been to having them, and the day is clear, and the
scent of the kitchen of each nearby restaurant is
carrying. And I am alive, and I am settling in, and
I have in my hand at last something I could not
bear to lose, some fibrous imperfect gift of a life
in the place of theoretical triumph: blistered heels
and my mother’s old dress and a self I can face
in the mirror; three long-stemmed lilies wrapped
in cellophane, an unripe blushing hydra, five
dust-pink tongues unfurled to catch the light.

Tate Fountain

Tate Fountain is a writer, director, and rule-of-threes captive published in Aniko Press Magazine, The Agenda, and Min–a–rets (Annexe), among others. She is currently a member of the Starling editorial committee, and is probably being loud about it on Instagram.