TRIP

You shine like a glazed clay bowl in the sun. The door slides shut behind you – leaning down towards me you say hello. I’m not as good as my fellow passengers at avoiding eye contact. Hello I reply. The seat between us littered with papers giving me space from you. Intense eyes and urgent mouth telling me I have a green aura, that I am very psychic. Can I see your hand. I offer it to you and nearly catch the eyes, of the woman opposite, widening. Producing a pen you trace my head, life, destiny and heart lines and circle the mounds of Jupiter, Saturn, Mars and Venus. The silver lines don’t show up well so each line is then retraced in black. My hand is magical, mysterious - its lines singing. You ask for paper and write three things on three pieces which you then tightly screw into my hand. They predict my later answers which you planted in my head. Being able to rummage in another’s head is sometimes useful but also dangerous. I do not deviate from my trip and arrive at my friend’s birthday party with a tattooed hand and a light heart.


* Sonia Jarema describes herself as an allotmenteer living on the edge of London.