tongue it various      from burr to babel      swish to swirl
rushes between buttresses      plaits threads of currents
where swans lord-and-lady-it along the centre
trips over own flow      with
fish-out-of-water flash      salmon’s silver high-jump

This love was. Slowly it becomes formless,
drifting, softening, snakeskin-empty,
the part it has played in who I am now
secreted in a pocket of a coat

When you enter mountains, afternoons stretch
and lengthen like days; mesmerise.

下午进山的人都会多活上一天
他们从这山望着更高的山
搓着通红的大手望山气变化

      Trespasses Forgive me The E flat on your baby grand (not quite in tune). This same finger in the crack that goes clean through the bungalow’s supporting wall. Then flicking dust from the fringed edge of your floral lampshade. Noticing that they...

You were the pine, softening the dirt I grew up in: the one I climbed in the breeze. Wanting to describe you, I had called you Paulie. That is not your name.

A Bad Spell

The rowan by the house is cracked in two,
her bark ragged, grown good-for-nothing old.

Cousin

I didn’t know who the call was about,
just that it was past my proper bedtime

All at sea on a serenity of sheep,
we played monopoly, box tatty and frail.
Its missing chance cards, no get-out-of-jail.

Mami, I find myself wishing your memory
were a bird of prey—
red-tailed hawk or black vulture . . .