I see your figure climbing up the hill by Esther van der Vyver

Esther van der Vyver | June 5th, 2009 | poetry | No Comments

I see your figure climbing up the hill
at first so small that I think it is
a statue a trick of the light
and what is this you are doing?
semaphores, Morse code
your arms blinking and wheeling in the
sunlight
to the rhythm of a language
obscure to me as dancing.
I see you bring flowers
at last
now that my feet have grown
sandals, fissures, tiny lizards
watching you incuriously
your approach
prophesied, denied
in tea leaves and lyres
I see you bring flowers.

I see you bring flowers
at last
now that my arms have fallen off
one at the shoulder
a luminous shrug
one just under the elbow
futile beckoning.
My eyes have grown
bullets, ballads
have burnt a hole in the backdrop
have singed the tree
my hands are gone, useless, forgotten.
I can still see you
you have set yourself alight
and are pushing out to sea
but in completely
the wrong direction.

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