Dawn Departures

You stack flack jacket and keffiyeh,

Into the grey plastic crate, ABC Baghdad;

Scrunch clothes into tubes,

Denude The Seven Pillars of its jacket –

Though you say it will be dusty there,

And hot, forty degrees – hence the sandals

And the desert scarf and the baseball cap.

The flex of your arms,

The sickle of skin at the base of your back:

You bend and push and tuck and fold.

I read by your absent expression

That you left many hours before.

A goodbye kiss, a three point turn

(Foot too hard on the gas);

In my rear view mirror

You watch me

Stalling still.

At home the redskin nuts I roasted

When you were here,

The books on my desk, last touched

When you were here,

And a corner of paper with your writing on.

I’m cycling to the shops when there’s a roar

Overhead and the white belly of a plane soars

Towards the Levant.