The Night Before, by Jo Dixon

Forest Witch, by Paul Klee (Switzerland) 1938

The Night Before
 
Their bodies open. Black-bar 
bones hold tight, try to hold in
 
skin let loose. Toes flex
in the tree-root earth.
 
Night falls into their fire
and smoke licks tongues, 
 
nipples, creases, crevices. 
Torsos chafe. Limbs buckle
 
together. Blush pink.

Jo Dixon

Jo Dixon is a poet, critic and academic living in Nottingham. She is lecturer in Creative Writing at De Montfort University Leicester. Her poems appear in a range of publications, including New Walk, The Interpreter's House, Furies (For Books’ Sake), In Transit (The Emma Press), South Bank Poetry and Places of Poetry: Mapping the Nation in Verse (Oneworld). Her debut poetry pamphlet, A Woman in the Queue, was published by Melos Press in 2016. Her first collection, Purl, is forthcoming from Shoestring Press in 2020. An article on Alice Oswald can be found at C21: Journal of 21st Century Writings: https://doi.org/10.16995/c21.588.