Thin slivers of bone stitch my
mind
to the fraying edge of time,
prick out bright beads of blood on
unknown fingers;
thimbles of thin silver or
hollowed ivory,
or bronzed and green with death,
cap unremarkable hands,
Roman, Inuit or Polynesian;
fading colours leap with life,
dull fabrics glow and move under a
flow of rippling shells,
of feather, tree-bark, hair;
the twist-tight strands of skin
grow supple, slip and bind;
silk is lit with fire again;
frail shreds of flax lift and
green in a tilled field,
open wide blue eyes to an old and
startled sky...
In the hushed museum
a thin draught threads and shakes
the fall of dreams,
time darkens the hangings of my
inner eye,
causing a flutter against the
bone.
(June,
1990)
