Teething ring, creamer, a
salt-cellar pagoda,
Georgian ladle and bone-handled
silver penknives -
an elegy of elegance huddles on
the larder floor,
a circling of strangers, a company
of despair.
Lift them out.
The smooth teething ring yellows
with mortality,
the silver marked with baby teeth
long swapped for fairy gold and
milky wishes;
the cow creamer is empty, barren
now,
the rich white life poured long
away,
the swollen flanks distended with
yesterday’s air and crazy hopes,
the polished hooves sharp on the
slipping moment;
round as comfort, tiny, the bowl
of the ladle
shines like a childhood moon,
the handle sweet as barley-sugar
twisting in rough whorls
against the finger-prints of time,
bright with expectation;
light slides down the sharp edged
promise of the east,
the silver roofs cut crisp and
pert
to make a mystic statement on
decent damask salted with memory;
the penknives dream, smooth with
thought,
their thin tongues eased from sleep
with careful thumb,
used to waiting in an abstract
silence
as the gas-globes sent shining
pools drifting down the blades,
falling away as someone trimmed
the quill,
eager to be writing across the
world, across time.
Silver dreams locked into the dark
of memory,
buried under the daily bread,
shadowed by oils and wines - and
vinegars;
boxed on a cold stone floor,
forgotten,
trying to bloom in a damp dark,
offering themselves to a light
that never comes,
waiting for the thief in the
night,
uncertain resurrection.
(December,
1989)
