Waiting for You - Jackie Morrison

3 May

One of the Top 24 submissions in our 2022 Urban Tree Festival writing competition.

WAITING FOR YOU

Days, it’s been weeks of days.
Out for an hour, dare not stay longer,
watch the sky through bare branches.
Back home the door swells and contracts
dries and cracks, ageing still.
I read our table, its rings and knots
pages of life, nature’s full stops
where new growth joined the trunk.

Days, it’s been weeks of days,
months of my shape changing.
Alone. We are brave.
Leaves unfurl, seed dust birls in the air.
You’re a girl, they say.
I dream of tiny feet,
deep ripples vibrating the room,
child-sized shoes on the wooden floor.

Days, it’s been weeks of days,
months, much waiting for you.
A lush canopy grows in the woods,
filtering a warming sky
where shapes will dance in your eyes under rose confetti.
And I daydream about me,
who I’ll be, after.
I’ll be the one with the pram in the trees.