standing on tiptoe like an orchid

i like the smell of soap on your hands and that when i wake up half out of bed i think of the blackbirds in the sky and two weeks, the two weeks until christmas. there will be tea and coffee, you will sit with me, and i will carefully put my fingers in your hair.
i didn’t like you when i was eleven. i liked you when i was fifteen and then one day i was seventeen and we were in your stupid truck. i made you stop and get out when we saw the dead fox in the road, i made you move it on to the edge where it would not be driven over again and again. and only because i remembered i had a cat that would drag home small brown mice, half alive, and i would sit at the bottom stairs, crying stupidly. one time my father came out and put it in the hedge, with its useless leg and bright, still eyes. i didn’t say anything to you about it after, but i made you come inside and wash your hands. now whenever i think of you, your arms are full and there are foxes in the kitchen sink.

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