Strange Days of March

Just learned of Nicholas Hughes' death (son of Sylvia and Ted). Oh, March, you wound.


Morning Song

Love set you going like a fat gold watch.
The midwife slapped your footsoles, and your bald cry
Took its place among the elements.

Our voices echo, magnifying your arrival. New statue.
In a drafty museum, your nakedness
Shadows our safety. we stand round blankly as walls.

I'm no more your mother
Than the cloud that distils a mirror to reflects its own slow
Effacement at the wind's hand.

All night your moth break
Flickers amongh the flat pink roses. I wake to listen:
A far sea moves in my ear.

One cry, and I stumble from bed, cow-heavy and floral
In my Victorian nightgown.
Your mouth opens clear as a cat's. The window square

Whitens and swallows its dull stars. And now you try
Your handful of notes;
The clear vowels rise like balloons.


(from Ariel)