iconic, complicit

 

 

 

we have played at falling in love
you and I, away in private rooms
nakedly, eyes locked and ignorant to plot and crew
felt the heat of skin on skin, a by-product of
high wattage bulbs and an eagerness to sell
authenticity made red carpet ready.

but this myth has leapt from our hands
a billion times over, an icy fiction
piggy-backed onto history
long after theatre floors have been
swept of tear-damp popcorn
the people returned to their homes
born-again believers in a love fit for drowning
they will project a version of us onto us.

 

 

- Joshua Gibson-Fraser