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LIV GOLDREICH

Second Prize - 2023 Tower Poetry Competition, 'The Planets'

 

Orbit

I’m having brunch with Buzz Aldrin in his penthouse.

He’s fried the eggs to perfection, dusted the avocado

with rock salt. He spreads butter with a child’s knife

and I think of the hands he has held. Whilst toasting

the pumpernickel he told me to make myself at home.

I flicked through his books, opened the closet

in the guest-bedroom. A planetarium of mothballs

and his father’s elbow-patched suits (the smell

of sea in sun). I’ve noticed Buzz loves circles,

serendipitous edges. His doors seem to roll back

on themselves, unhinged, a circuitry in their joints. Even

his nostrils seem more circular and softer than mine.

He scoops butter into spheres and later I follow him

to the supermarket and notice his love for the fruit

aisle, the tenderness with which he rubs a Pink Lady.

When he peels a clementine the skin bends to his will.

In the evening he smells of museum and gravel.

He guides the orb of my eye to the lights.