– 119 –

Grace to the Goodsyard

I break things because I am afraid and I spend my time repairing
It's almost the expression of love
I found these beautiful machines abandoned here
Sometimes there is nothing to inherit

It's almost the expression of love
To hunt, to seduce, to deal with a stone
Sometimes there is nothing to inherit
Footprints on the path that leads to the house

To hunt, to seduce, to deal with a stone
I did not even know that I was naked
Footprints on the path that leads to the house
In that street, close to the sky

I did not even know that I was naked
I set out, taking my precautions
In that street, close to the sky
I must tell my story, and I must forget my story

I set out, taking my precautions
I found these beautiful machines abandoned here
I must tell my story, and I must forget my story
I break things because I am afraid and I spend my time repairing

– 120 –

The Clover Seed Hex

Once my foot was like a cube of sugar.
I ran deep in the village, playing on a drum,
happy even with the stones on the road.
I swept the air like this with my hand.
Like a dove, but my father was behind me.

The one I took was a poor man, the one
who limped, and it turned out badly.
It is said that a married man and woman
must be like a tomb. There was a stranger
who followed me home also. He put
his eye to the keyhole and looked at me.
He was a man already. I didn't see him.
I turned the water jug over on its mouth.

Men are never afraid. They know everything,
not like women, and in other ways
we have taken their hardness. A woman
has to be fine and weak. He loves her tears.
One man came close to me after a time,
and during the small feast I answered, ‘Yes.’
Childlessness can come of dishonour.
In other words, mine was a black deed.

The mothers of the boys are passing
on the opposite side of the street,
the Nile side. They say, ‘So and so
was ruined because of her.’ Let them
talk and pass. I walk in fields
I am unfamiliar with, and it may be that
when I fall down I am under some spell.
In any case, half of beauty is darkness.
Are these things in our hands?

– 121 –

A Patient Carpentry

quince tree, birds, light shows, rains, everything.

Joseph Cornell

A ship that was mostly cobweb,
someone so astonishingly lean,
who had himself sold fabric
for a decade. A kind of voyager,
and his notes were full of
references to pigeons taking flight,
to theatres he would never step
inside, to moons. Just enough
body to keep a soul in. A gaze
like caged birds. His evenings
were uneventful, but he seemed
not to mind, prizing echoes
over truths, thimblefuls.
Winter was coming, and the house
was quiet, except for the rattling
of the radiator, and it would
just come over him sometimes
towards midnight: an image of her
sorting through his papers
and books, or moving about
on his enclosed porch,
as the planets orbited coldly.