Warmer Days
By Lucius Falkland

When I think of you

I become the Kalahari.

In one direction: shrub land,

Squat acacias, camel thorns,

A few distant Khoi-Khoi huts

And beyond that, the pot-holed tarmac road

Of me over twenty years ago,

When our eyes glinted as one,

Like the Kalahari Dream,

And we felt bonds almost as permanent.

In the other direction,

The sand storms have striped me

With winding flaxen lines

Which meander towards an empty horizon

Where you – baked air on blue –

Continue to shimmer.

Sometimes, when I look that way

Your heat upon me is still so powerful  

It bends light itself

But it feels like the perfect warmth

As if I’m Cecil Rhodes,

Reclining in his Kimberley garden,

Straw hat, glass of Pimms; ice. 

I suppose you’re in Kimberley now;

A consultant these days?

Two children; White Topaz spouse.

The same, except I’m further north,

As far from the Kalahari as one could be,

But your haze . . . it’s still on the horizon,

Especially on warmer days . . . like these.