The Most Beautiful Woman in the History of Lawn Tennis

At night we reinvent ourselves as moths
that can’t remember, if they ever knew,

how to be alive or who they are
or where there is to crawl to except hair,

that think they know what Love is
but they don’t,

no-one does, it is unknowable,
along with everything else, including me;

including things in zoos that can’t be bred from
or even kept alive, that bite their keepers;

including tongues, and the gift of tongues,
and bedding that’s not wet and doesn’t move;

including the ex-dancer you’re convinced
is the most beautiful woman in the history of lawn tennis.

from People Who Like Meatballs (Bloodaxe, 2012), Selima Hill 2012, used by permission of the author and the publisher

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