It is beyond me, building this hut
according to the rules

Three walls, twenty cubits high
a roof of branches

to make clear to houses
of brick and stone

that they too are just a hut
in the scheme of things

I should have called a rabbi
with a squad of helpers

eager for points in heaven,
but I needed you

your Arab skin encountering mine,
its fragility.

Sally Michaelson is a conference interpreter in Brussels and her poems have been published in Lighthouse and Ink, Sweat and Tears.

Abramovic and Ulay
divorced in the middle
after walking the Great Wall
from opposite ends.

John and Yoko
stayed in bed for a week
to make love not war
a performance of sorts.

Pietragalla and Derouault
danced love with their bodies,
more reliable than words
on stage and off.

Beauvoir had lovers in her room
overlooking Notre Dame,
Sartre met her later
au Café de Flore.

I wonder what couple we’d be
if you didn’t pull out of me
into your clothes
when the afternoon alarm rings?

Sally Michaelson is a conference interpreter in Brussels and her poems have been published in Lighthouse and Ink, Sweat and Tears.