Harpist
More animal than angel, that look
in his eyes; kestrel, say –
the way, hunched forward
on the small wooden stool,
he might have caught sight
of something far beyond our vision,
suddenly borne up
by those flurrying, horn-hard fingers.
Summer Bruises
They would come up like targets
on the inside of your thigh,
their mottled purples
fading through the rainbow, spilling out
from the traumatised core –
a squashed red circle of flesh, bisected
with twin dotted lines: the imprinted seam
of hurled, hard leather.
Brands of a sort, or war-wounds,
to be inspected and tended
amid smells of liniment and linseed,
stale sweat and damp towels.
They spoke of making your mark;
standing your ground.
*Chris Tracy graduated from the University of East Anglia in 2003 and lives in Norwich.
