Good afternoon, she said, it’s me.
I thought I might phone today
because . . .
I was wondering you see
how your voice would sound,
how you might speak to me
(if you would speak to me at all
that is).
It’s probably an intrusion,
but I’m curious to know if
what you write is how you are,
and how you are . . . she paused,
then said, I meant to say . . .
but she didn't.
She’d not prepared herself
for silence at the other end.
The most wonderful
of December days,
the distant cliffs had glowed
as afternoon had slowly
wound down into dusk.
The tide had turned,
and turning itself about,
was going out.
Picking up her mobile phone
from an ever-cluttered table
(where she watched the sea
and sometimes wrote)
now spurred by the moment
said aloud - I can. I shall.
Oh and this imagining
they were out with the dogs
on the sand, these two writers
talking seamlessly about this
writing life, their poetry please.
Are you there? , she said, knowing,
though his number dialled,
she hadn’t really placed the call.
A rehearsal, she told herself firmly,
that was only a rehearsal after all.