izzy

know why I chose the white radio?
true story.
what’s going on, a little scrabble action?
did he?
that’s great, good for you!
whatever, whatever, the point is you’re together playing, god bless
oh, no, just here to pick up my father.

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sarah

Postcards from Indonesia:

The pool is quiet in the morning heat. An Australian man in his 50s (why is everyone here Australian?) heaves himself into a shallow seat in the water and rolls slowly to bake his stomach. The hair on his shoulders looks like wings. A woman steps up, child in hand, takes a photo on her iPad and he looks up. ‘Oh, I’m not taking a photo of you!’ she says. ‘Ah, it’s alright’, he says jovially. ‘I’m a beached whale here.’ He splashes water onto his gut. ‘Just gotta keep tipping water on me.’ The bartender at the swim-up bar nestles between bottles of bourbon and rum and scribbles furiously in a notepad. He is probably tallying yesterday’s sales, or ordering more mixer, but I hope he is writing a poem for a lover. Swim up verse. Poolside poetry. A beer and a quatrain for 50,000 rupiah. More waddling baked Australian seniors stroll past, clutching folded notes, in a country where we are all millionaires.

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