Suntan Lotion

Ideas and inspiration for writing tend to come when I'm out and about, usually going to or coming from work.

I wait

at the bus stop

while the sun

grows hot

on the pavement.

Two growing boys

and

one of their mothers

join me.

The friend

listens to the bubbling

of the son

while the mother reaches into her bag.

Before her purse

she finds a plastic tube,

pulls it out,

flips the cap,

and squeezes lotion

onto one palm.

With her free hand

she inserts the tube

into the crevice

between arm and breast,

and holds it

tenderly

- like an egg

in an Alsatian’s mouth.

She places her empty palm

onto the lotion in the other

and circles the two.

Then with the heels

of spade-like hands

she turns her son to face her.

She smooths the lotion

onto the boy’s upturned face.

He interrupts his words’ flow

while his face is

pushed through the dilating palms.

She feels the warmth of his skin

as it pushes against her.

He is reborn –

hot, flushed and greasy –

protected from the Sun,

vernix reapplied.

The friend,

still in his listening silence,

watches

and finds himself

engrossed

by the intimacy of the act.

The mother,

massaging the face between her palms,

looks at him,

her eyelids slowly curtain her eyes.

The face in her hands

will forever be a child;

but in the other

she recognises the man

in the boy.

And he sees her -

naked within her clothes-

a joint of adult flesh

basted with sweat.

His own mother

kneeling naked

on his parents’ bed

flashes across his mind -

the small moment of her breasts,

a dark triangle 

hiding beneath the overhang of her belly.

He pockets his clenched hands

and steps briefly to the side.

- as if to relax.
A slight knee bend

and his elbow and hip

clumsily touch the 
misjudged bus shelter.

The woman

still looks at him

- Would you like some?

His voice cannot say it

but he shudders his head.

His heart pumps.

Blood rushes to his earlobes.

His fringe falls into his eyes

he sniffs and shakes the head again

to delete it, 
his eyes darting hopefully to the road end.

Here it is.

He breathes.

The bus pulls up

and a comfortable cloud

of busyness

rains onto the group again

as they mount the steps

and push themselves

up the bank of the aisle

to seats either side.

I board.

And from behind them

I watch the mother,

cleansing her hands

on the skin at the back of her neck,

the friend

looking with constructed casualness

through the other dusty window,

while on the seat between them

the boy –

the child –

bounces.