The Forest at the Back of the Throat
Curl unfurl
a girl of ash paths
inhabits
her
leaf-blown body
stalked by gen-
erations
nations notions
of implanted fear
reach strain
test the cliff behind
the cliff-face
spider race inside
the bone-house
balancing china
bowls like skulls
judder stutter
putter
he plucks cobweb
strings of a lyre
croaks for the thin wraiths
in the forest
behind the eyes
jaw stretch lip husk
retch rust
and reek
how do we
get used
to this?
Habere[1]
Filamental memoranda in the loam,
electrical burblings beneath tarmac,
pavement slabs and blue cobbles,
shielded from the bright morning.
What’s today’s mycelium gossip?
What are the trees complotting
in symbiotic secretions of sugar?
With hoar still coating grass blades,
bide time, don't break the crust,
the glaucous gull scours the river,
my shadow pools in the storm drain,
duramen heartwoods in dormancy
manufacture deities and demons,
and a painful truth lies at the root.
The warblings of wary ewes
watching us through slitted stares
from terraces of slate,
riddled with boltholes
to hidden warrens that run
to the hill's stilled core
a winding, cropped-grass scar
across the grizzled god's upper lip
gouged cheeks and brow
up to the crown of Scotch Pine
behind a fleece-rubbed dry-stone wall,
where rabbit vanishes through a gap
too small to follow so we climb
careful, over snug, well-placed rocks
to drop onto lush grass, well-held shade,
enclosed shelter with a cairn-child
marking the centre,
the moon rests here to sip its milk,
dribble light into Lune and Tees,
we tread circles of faith to view
the settlement’s rough bark, leathers,
furs and bronze, patient tokens
lost to the barrow, Prince Rabbit
on the Ram's Horn Throne perched
as if he's carved from sandstone,
tunnel-bound beneath our toes,
hoarding centuries in each bulbous eye
like he's dreamed us here
to scaffold his edges
to stake out all
of his non-existent corners.
to haul the whole
of his depth from darkness.
[1] habere "to have, to hold, possess"
(from PIE root *ghabh “to give or receive").
Bob Beagrie
(PhD) lives in Middlesbrough. He has published numerous collections of poetry
and several pamphlets, most recently: When We Wake We Think We’re Whalers
from Eden (Stairwell Books 2021) And Then We Saw The Daughter of
the Minotaur (The Black
Light Engine Press 2020), Civil Insolencies (Smokestack 2019).
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