I am only watching from a distance,
Wellington is home.
Here, I discover the problem with kissing:
teeth.
In St Petersburg, warming
a lover’s hands in the sharp winter air is defiant.
meanwhile; cocooned by the South Pacific
her mouth is soft –
we are in public.
Henrietta Bollinger is a poet, playwright and columnist, based in Wellington, New Zealand. She is also an accidental Sociology student and a feminist. Her poems have been published in Redraft, Starling and Mimicry journals. Her plays have been performed in New Zealand, Australia and the UK. She is new to Scum.
