open road

 

this journey       somewhere between

 

now at least       (whipping through landscapes
with fields and trees       munching cows
grubby sheep       horses moving fast)

 

and that’s real       (clouds
the colour of a bruise behind a line of poplars
a glimpse of a hawk circling high)

how it all fits together       neatly
this syntax

---

 

the theatre box

(after max beckmann)

 

wife       mistress       or simply escort for the evening
her pearled and sequinned poise is faultless

leaning into the chimera light
her grip on her fan perhaps a little too tight

the trail of her arm along the balustrade
a little too easy

which play is she watching from beneath those white
half-shut lids masking eyes

like obsidian mirrors
at her back the gentleman leans away

into the line of the arch that frames her
pauses in his scan about the house

(are those wings of angels painted on his upturned glasses)
perhaps a tense moment in the action

makes her fingers grip the rail
just before the flourish

where the edge of the box tilts into darkness

 

Copyright © Catherine Hales, 2004.

Catherine Hales grew up in Surrey and now lives in Berlin. She has published poems in various magazines, including Stride, Orbis, Fire, Haiku Quarterly and Brittle Star, with work forthcoming in Fire, Neon Highway and Coffee House Poetry.