you watched the buses snake
through the curly kelburn hillside
and accidentally ashed your cig
over the unmarked grave
of the mouse I found that morning
beneath the kitchen sink
while telling me how the pine smelt
like trees and not your father
burnt christmas candles
low-grade bleach.
you started shivering
should we have gone inside?

cherries
stinging saltwater eyes
peachy skin thirsting for cold aloe vera
the feeling of paddle pops melting down sweaty wrists
evenings arriving without goose pimples
incense hanging in the air without a wind to whisk it away
flowering pōhutukawa trees
red stamens blanketing your windshield
sitting under the warm fiery glow
spilling G&T over your copy of Wuthering Heights
hanging it up to dry on the clothesline
beside our t-shirts wet only around the tits
your face in the three o’clock sun
chocolate hair melting—dripping down your neck
nose stained pink—tiny lipstick kisses
freckles left spilt across your cheeks
til autumn came to pick them back up

My old coconut perfume
smells like mornings in Ōrākei.
I would wake up
hungover driving home
friends who I no longer have
anything in common with.

I still can’t drink
Malibu. It smells like pouring
half drunken bottles
down the kitchen sink,
wiping stickiness
from the benches.

My finger is bleeding.
Sliced it on a bottle cap.
The band-aid smells
like the Hawaiian air freshener
that it used to live with
in the glovebox.