SOPHIE VAN WAARDENBERG

schön

my girl watered her cacti until they drowned
my girl filled my house with flowers until the house coughed and
  fell down

my girl ties yellow ribbons to my hair with her cold hands
and calls me beautiful in swooping German and my girl laughs

when my girl laughs she cuts my life in two and two again
where she kisses me there is love fizzing from my cheeks to the car
  windows

and we walk into the supermarket at midnight when the lilies have
  gone quiet
and hold hands past the eggs and milk and cut-price Easter bunnies

when my girl wakes up she looks at me close and still smiles
my girl nearest to me in the world plucks her eyebrows and frowns
  and proves her face

my girl and I, here we are, refusing to decide what to feed each other
in the crumbed kitchen with the lights off

my girl and I spill our egg yolks on Wednesday’s astrology
forget that we are paper boats pushed out to sea by wistful hands

my girl forgets with me the drycleaning ticket
my girl forgets with me the breakfast cost

my girl becomes a calendar and I curl up inside her
my girl becomes a tongue twister and I curl up inside her

my girl lets the spring in through her hands
she puts her hands over my ears and I remember how it feels

it is nice and nice and nice

Sophie van Waardenberg is an editor, research assistant, and bookshop assistant whose poetry and essays have been published in Starling, Mimicry, and Takahē. She was born in London and lives in Auckland.

van Waardenberg comments: ‘This is an almost completely trivial poem, about the nearly nursery rhyme of early love, how everything’s pink and easy. Maybe it’s an annoying poem, maybe reading it is like having a couple walking down the footpath in front of you, holding hands so you have to walk behind them at their speed. I’d never let myself write about something so nice before this.’

​Poem source details >

​Links
Sophie’s poetry in Starling 6 and Starling 7