115

She rose and saw the fiery distance
Spill its light across the ocean
Saw the bridge across the river
Flaming like a molten archway
Saw the trucks and peak hour traffic
Driving on with windows blazing
Watched until the glory faded
Spread her arms and made her silence
Weaving wide across the water
Breath and flesh in graceful braiding
Lip and eye in liquid dancing
Hand and foot to form the measure
First a voice rose from the shoreline
A flute of silver thinly piping
Second came a puff of feathers
White a flour blue as razors
Third a tongue as gold as butter
Fourth the claws and fifth the blinking
Sixth the muscle run to wingtip
Last she sang it whole and living
Set the blood its breathing circle
Let her heart fly to its freedom


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128

Never mind that stupid TV - where'd you put my office laptop? Anything that I leave down here, you just move it without asking . . . All the diagrams and schemas for the motorway enhancements, and my PowerPoint presentation that I spent the weekend tweaking, are on that, so if the peak-hour traffic bugs you, help me find it!

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