paper blues

I. first roll of film

the fern outward curl, light underberries, undertrail, a soft movement in the grass, an anchor, a sun glimpsed through the fronds / the long afternoon settling over our shoulders, the long wind like a mirror of light falling this late August, jute rugs on the floor ghosts pinned against the window, hung on clothes pegs tongue tied, brittle, speaking in half-formed echoes ferns opening at nightfall, moth flame flickering in the moonlight

II. second roll of film

feels like there is no way forward, no scope for the brush of memory the bridges the boundary lines the sky full of volcanic ash and wishful proximity if this were a movie two winters would have flown by if this were a movie there would be no summer just solstice equinox solstice equinox an unchanging dreamscape an endless field of wheat

III. third roll of film

softly pressing our fingers to the ends of the rice paper, then rolling it up there is an indent the shape of a smile rice paper blues outgrowing friends and their inkpens her teeth are backlit in this orange light her diagonally sliced spring onions are a casualty of this light frame after frame the rice paper melts, freezes, perfectly imagined rolls