Mornings stretch at the threshold
With slug-like stoicism
My vertebrae cling
To the memory of sleep
The ritual of waking
Cannot be observed backwards.
From dreams, to open eyes
To unfurled limbs
To layers, to crumbs -
The arresting picture of
A child in ill-fitting armour
Quickly emerges,
Idly put together
Like a six-piece jigsaw puzzle.
We ride towards the sun
A squashed toad stretches
Next to a squashed newt
As if a child had abandoned
Am impromptu dissection
In the middle of the road
Living beasts
Zoom across the road
I believe in the tail-flashing rabbits,
But the moss-skinned deer
Seem ghostly,
Unreliable apparitions.
Nature has painted
The spectacle of the dead
And the near-dead in
Vivid greens and reds
Colour-blind,
Death gently exhales
Under the car tyres
With slug-like stoicism
My vertebrae cling
To the memory of sleep
The ritual of waking
Cannot be observed backwards.
From dreams, to open eyes
To unfurled limbs
To layers, to crumbs -
The arresting picture of
A child in ill-fitting armour
Quickly emerges,
Idly put together
Like a six-piece jigsaw puzzle.
We ride towards the sun
A squashed toad stretches
Next to a squashed newt
As if a child had abandoned
Am impromptu dissection
In the middle of the road
Living beasts
Zoom across the road
I believe in the tail-flashing rabbits,
But the moss-skinned deer
Seem ghostly,
Unreliable apparitions.
Nature has painted
The spectacle of the dead
And the near-dead in
Vivid greens and reds
Colour-blind,
Death gently exhales
Under the car tyres
