30 October 2004

breathing between the lines

Rome’s still in ruins
(smouldering)

Goths squat before
(smouldering)
ruins

- - -

in Byzantium
ephemeral blood beaters

filter the night
for protozoa

- - -

anything goes in the land of
the hungry

or deeply disappointed

- - -

(that big O that noose for noughty
thoughts the rough press on my throat I don’t want to
wear it again)

- - -

in the high country
north somewhere

alps, whatever

- - -

and in the broken alps
the broken blades of sky

fall on ingrate tarns
their slippery shards

traipse down tracheas

of light