Ella Quarmby

The last time I saw you it was
the early morning, you were leaving
and I was glad
that in the dark of saved daylight
I could pass my silence off as sleep.

Your arm must have been outstretched
for the bus. I never thought about the shape
of that until now. I spent winter in my
cornered bed and against my own weather
this time.

In spring I perch atop the dune,
above the wash.
It spumes and apologises
towards where I am standing,
never going further than the bleached
branch still lying
half-washed-up.

And the salt spit
blurs the horizon, like the curve of your
blue plastic pool. You used to roll
our afternoons down the hill,
you were a vortex and covered in grasses,
I was a spinifex and I was tumbling.
In the hum of low lights we slept
on small couches.

I want to spit back
on everything you still say:
Remember the estuary?
Februarys?
I think you have made me.