With Cloth and Clown

with cloth and clown

with after-born comes lifeless to the hybrid

to the geese of throbbing beauty on a starboard bow

migrating to-and-fro as taverns rave and rant and roar

warring hens christened without purpose to the crown

as climbs the Downs of pollen fractured seed of opium

half artichoke - half mute -

half penny to a whole man feeding sperm from cage to womb

to honour and exhume one being great as god

as great as wedlock hinges cold as string;

how far gone the days when once life treasured craft?

with cockrel, hen, with bulls blood running through the veins of ram horn, blows a wind

a winding wind as tall as Northern Star

stands silent through a weathered dust

from child to trinket

from trinket to a blood lost wrist

a scissored hand cuts deep beyond the comet of the eye

post-war past anticlimax as,

caged birds as aged venom whistles helpless as a beacon on a wing

hooked on absynth daffodil and kissed by Autumn feed

but green hands to the father of the plague

the frail limbs once of March Hare

now a wilderbeast as strong as skin is weak

kissing boneless with the grateful dead

as puppets dance a tango dressed as cigarette and pipe

still silent through a weathered dust, to silently reflect

from boy to man

from man to father of the plague

from mother to a cage where died my womb;