Sad how things expire before you work out
what they mean. Like earlier I was noticing
the rose petals on the path, all damp and slick,

For the Peregrines of Offham Chalk Pit The quarry holds your eyrie like a grateful palm. You - indelicate gobber all gape and gum-pink circled in the beach white like a mouth stuck in wonder. O spit-shrieker coming back for yourself, tearing fur so diligently, never...

The cat puts his paw on my hair, and I think about
where we could go if we weren’t here. Maybe the
nail salon, which seems like a good destination for
kill time Saturdays.

Dear Fish, you swam from life and gave your flesh; forgive me.
In your ice-tomb, your scales a rainbow of tiny glaciers, frozen in flight;
like you, I let myself get caught, sank my heart in a false sea.

The God I know works as a baker in a local shop.
From time to time, I see him feeding the kittens bread crumbs soaked in milk.

Rhubarb after Norman MacCaig And another thing: stop looking like embarrassed celery. It doesn’t suit. How can you stand there, glittery in pink, some of you rigid, some all over the shop? Deep down you’re marooned, a sour forest spilling out beneath a harmful canopy....

You stand behind me / catch my eye / take the snatch of silver

after the accident the plaster
held her still