Alchemisland

Youth is some too rich fool’s walled estate A ruined view. The groomed stones I raked fluted for calm Having completed the task of their taming I kick back to placeless safety; that natural madness Which becomes a meadow and undoes a man. For you I pollute the ring-hued arches of my fastness I let…

I prescribe myself I longed to describe myself But this scribe often finds That rite denied. Incapable Our mythmaking eyes Of lifting the I’s impenetrable shine. She moved around my room like a jilter up the aisle Slow, as if time might lengthen abidingly A book without staples My hooking pages come away Like traumatised…

Suncoloured in my holding hands A golden lance, molten exact Christ-bathed. Moment elapses Smoker relapses Hold of old habits We never leave our old houses Old hats, old rabbits A palace lapsing  A backward champion The stallion asking Bits for champing.