Sweets
by Bev Braune
I meet two large women with boxes of sweets,
the wrappers opening with curled edges.
Inside, nuts are glassed in blood-red sugar,
rolled in waves of chocolate.
The women lift their fingers to paint my lips
like old friends dropping in for a delicious visit.
The two, so sure on pleasure,
take me close to their breasts,
take me into the light-filled and glistening case,
curve their sweet palms to my face,
pull baubles of perfume from my throat,
turn every moment into flight,
and I am swallowed up by the mouth of waking-up
with dreams on my lips and my tongue on fire.
Bev Braune is a poet and essayist on poetry and poetics, literature and film. She has a Doctorate in Creative Arts for ‘Skulváði Úlfr: Historical Lacunae and Poetic Space’ (UOW thesis, 1999). Her poetry books include Camouflage(Bloodaxe Books, 1998) on the search for beauty in the modern world. Among other journals where her work has appeared are Antipodes, Sulfur, Southerly, VLAK, The Independent (UK) and New Trad. She has read her work as an invitee to academic conferences and literary festivals in Australia and Germany.