Cuckolds: poems

 Cuckolds.

They surely were

Those big men sobbing on

Sweethearts breasts, cuckolds.

For that one you may be sure of it,

That She

Fucked with a swan

And hatched it

Called it ‘ my own’

Nursed it on swollen breasts

That Leda!

But who can forget the other one

The Minotaur, quiet in its field

Fed some seven virgins

When she, that Pasiphae snuck from her husbands bed

To stare at the great beast

And its astonishing member

Back she came that very night in

Little quiet slippers, disrobed and

well.. where do you think you

Got your Curly hair and bad attitude from

Zeus, she said it was a God!

But see here, that other one

The oracle, the One kept in the cave,

O, the frightful visage of the old

Sibyl kept without a man to trot out

God knows what mad talk!

Kept so long she wrinkled like a

Prune

And hung suspended in a cage all

Oracular fury ,until she died of it.

The reigning one they say is young raving

Mad and lovely though and can tell

You how you’ll die as well

All inscribed on slate and rushed to

fevered emperors brow with instructions to

Kill and kill now: deceiving imps are

everywhere!

Or surely second to none that one,Danae

So plain so ordinary

Is what makes this tale really dazzle

She was embraced by Zeus

And fell all out

In a golden shower!

O fall down heavens upon me if I lie

Abandon the secure place in my chest

Prophetic and pulsating heart

Swimming in a steady stream of 

Oxygenated blood.

Or that one , Salome  dancing with the ankle bells

What did she want?

Nothing less than a human head

But on a charger in a pool of blood.

And Samson while he slept

Well who could forget that haircut?

All through time we see women

Make away with swans and bulls

And beget or even hatch,

Offspring

They assure us men, that look like us.

The shower of gold my erring wife

Became since accosted by a God in

Her daily walk collecting daises in the fields,

Mean we cannot share the bathroom

She’s all done up, all glamour

Before her mirror these mornings

Calling on the delectable God and

Singing to him in her golden flute voice.

I say, sweet, a man has to eat !

Too many mornings of black toast and honey dripping from her lips,

Cause me to suspiciously engage

With that delirium she’s having

So like an organism from outer space

What is this apparition, that is pleasuring my wife

what's happening

Here?

But try it yourself some time

Chatting up a pussy that’s transforming into a shower

Of gold, and all spruced up for a God!

And then, what did she hatch Leda

Well those peculiar long necked people

With a passion for feathers,

Don't you know!

Who poets remark, of their kind its more they glide than walk, and sing as well of their snowy bosoms.

O unwholesome fuck, that rendered 

Nations continent with a proliferation of swans; that in time too

Would become poetry.

The bull born boy, they called him that, the Minotaur

But never in the presence of his suspicious stepfather

Spawned a heap of things that

Farmers refused to keep in their fields.

And no woman would cuddle.

That loathsome lot have golden

Curly hair and its remarked when

Sun goes down they bellow and gambol in the field

Each one thoughtfully named, 

Though names can be rearranged.

There’s Bellows (no prizes for guessing the why of that) and there a brown

Eyed one with a foundlings gaze is called Uriah Heep ( for reasons to do with litigation).

As much as anything the milky white one, is Satan’s angel delight and all of these were born of women

Curled into swans wings, fucking

Or under bulls, priapic wonders

They were licking

Or  they were fallen upon in days

When they were simply walking, plucking flowers

transforming into showers of gold

There was no housework done

And even honey was tormenting!

The way she rolled it about and licked it with her tongue

No man could stand it..

-___________________________________________________________________________

2. 

God

Yes, God 

you may have made the winds

but you didn’t teach them

moderation or manners did you?

no

you let them loose to howl

like wild wolves through empty

rooms and even frighten children!

Yes, God you may have made the

winds

but you didn’t tell them to be nice

did you?

didn’t pin back their ears and put 

a bit in their mouths

so they’d have to behave

themselves!

no

you let them loose to howl through

deserts

to sweep oceans in furious roars

and you never said, frolic only like

lambs on earth so you don’t upset

people, now did you?

yes, God you may have made the

rain

but you didn’t give it any instructions

when to stop did you?

no, you let it loose to flood plains

and whimsical like stop in parched

places where it is most needed so

people have no water and animals die

of thirst

yes, God you may have made the sun

and in a happy moment said to your

big warm globe, shine on everyone!

because you Woz having a happy

moment!

O God how we live for your happy

moments

shine on everyone! your say 

we are so happy!

but it doesn’t obey you either does it?

just shines when it likes

and sinks over horizons like a hot

footed vagrant

leaving us longing, shivering and

cold.

yes, God you may have made the 

birds

and tickled their new formed throats

so that they’d sing a little love song

a little paean of love to us your

human bunnies

but did you explain to them that

people like peace and quiet at dawn

oh no!

and that some of us are not pleased

with their good natured warbling

and poor Romeo and Juliet did you

spare a thought for them

when your rising sun announced the

coming day and meant they must

part forever

this pair of star crossed lovers

and stars, surely if they were crossed

you could have uncrossed them!

Yes, God you may have made the

stars but they haven’t any sense of 

direction and who’s to say that they are

really twinkling?

they may just be malevolently

winking at us

and yes, god it has always been in

our interest to accept smiley

attributes and sentiments about

these pitiless things

we dare not think that you made the

world in just this way because your

brain was lazy

and we ourselves are further proof

of a flawed artistic sensibility

Loosened on earth like those same

wild winds to fall on others like those

very same wild wolves

demented in our affections like that

unreliable sun

weak at the knees for 'twinkle twinkle 

little star 'and 'somewhere over the rainbow'

and shooting arrows into the hearts

of dawn starlings

why because it hurts them!

Oh god who let you loose with

paint and brush

this human shape to make with

nothing but a questioning stare to

take it through this madness!

_________________________________________________________________________________

3. 

My Wife

 

She hummed into my heart like a butterfly 

And fluttered there to drive me wild

She loved colours, saffron and sky blue,

Her hair a mane of darkness, sun struck in places with living light

Her feet so small so brown her skin so dappled soft and golden

Her eyes light up like diamonds.

 

There was a place for everything and everything in it's place

Remembered birthdays, breast fed babies, soft hands that stroked their hair ,soft eyes that looked on little injuries with great concern and care

She was my wife!

 

The hand that rocked the cradle

Miracles, flowers, dogs and gardens too

Wildly named children laughter tinkling

like bells

The auditoriums of new worlds young stars they reached up for

 

And after all have I been forgotten?

 

I cannot follow where they go

And she .. She cannot hide her reproach

I gather up my wallet, consider a room in my home with no reflecting mirrors and head out ,dark ,large into the gloom of the world and war swinging like time bombs in my eyes

 

In just a second as unfortunate as that of Lot whose wife was turned to a pillar of salt 

I look back

She is standing in the doorway, and I see what I know but cannot bear the stars have gone out in her eyes

Snow begins to fall ,it falls into her hair still pitch black still perfect

Then she raises her hand and in time honoured fashion

Waves and even smiles at me

But I think I know that I will not see her again

As girl fluttering in sunlight with a butterfly heart and so many rainbow coloured saris

I know I will never see her again smiling when I tell her she is beautiful and that I love her,

In half a second they say all our lives can flash before us,

True I have put out her eyes ,true I have broken her heart

True she still has the automatic response of waving hand and rictus smile upon her lips.

Have I killed my wife? Can some other man make her whole again

She cried and cried

I could have watered a whole Eden with her tears

Her river of tears that I stopped with kisses and promises , that would flow again with each new wound.

 

But in her eyes I see no summers now and as the car pulls away me with with me in it, a storm of world affairs in my head, I see

She is standing not caring that the snow is covering her hair everywhere it falls on her dark hair a soft mess of melting water and white flakes

Is she not cold is she not aware why does she not turn to go in..?

The car turns out of the drive now I cannot see her anymore

I call out her name I say stop the car take me back

But relentless and not hearing the driver just drives on

I lower my head into the world of affairs I have to deal with now

While she unlocks her life from me each clink of the key unturning ,a terrible agony 

Driver stop the car and take me back!

Oh god I love my wife

It's unravelling now like a great bear skin upon the floor the pelt of my affections she has worn this these many years, surely she will not forsake the warm for the cold! She would die of it poor lamb she needs my love!

 

Naked ,small and grim she takes a shower washes the scent of me out of her hair

The children are safely away there is a letter for me the name and address of her solicitor

 

She picks up her small bag and enters the hallway turns off lights

In the snow with her packed bag she begins to walk away

Oh no please please don't go,

But there are no strings to play on her heart anymore

And her walk is full of silence.

________________________________________________________________________________

4.

Salutation

 

My head is a great sun

Greeting the trees with flames

Hail trees!

Great mama elephants rush from 

The veld to greet me

Screaming their scream

Hail elephants!

My pathetic skin bounces on

Surfaces like loosened cannon balls

And my eyes bat back time

Like dials

Diamonds of the mind.

That precious tick tock

Grass sprouts through my eye sockets

O I thought they were precious!

I wear my hands loosely

And pour my breath upon the earth

Scorching it.

Bodies may lie in earth as bleached bones

But we are animals in the sun

Shaking, out our dragon tails, and snaky hair

Hail! sinewy coppery curls that

Once were so frequently besotted by man!

 

My deep bellied cats slink closely, to

Me

When I breath they breath,

When I flick my affectionate fingers

They shake from

Me like hailstones and run

Fleet footed cats with long 

Miaows ,that whistle in the veld

On long whiskers

Twitching, they go.

The moon is a slit of belly in my

Mouth like an antelope I caught

And named moon.

I am an animal in the sun

Turning homewards.

I enter the water and breath a great sigh

The waters divide before me

The fishes hum in my hair

My faithful cats enter behind me

My great sleepers attend me

My big sun head is above

The floating waters

Between my toes are whorled sea shells

My hands fork lightning

 

Hail thunder!

 

It is night

As we cross the great ocean.

 

These caves of me, the Jinny spells

The dizzy hurricanes, the summer ghosts rise in waves

And leave me then,

At each shoreline

Are ones I know who knew me

Hail great seas!

My silent cats swim behind me

Our eyes are glass, our natures are

Like mercury, volatile and changeable.

The cool wind reaches me and

Offers me my own shape.

I come ashore my cats too

Walk out, their pelts shaking

They rub me down with 

Great rough tongues

We are animals in the sun

Turning homewards

 

 

O Lord I said it is a cabbage

But I gave it too much oxygen

Now it wants to be a flower

 

O elephants with your tails I tied together speak to me!

O trees sentinel still

Pour back on me your crazy light!

This great sun rocking in its cradle of bone

Salutes you

Several stalks of grass approach

To reproach me for the weather

The umbilical chords of a thousand baby me’s

Are lining the skies like planets

Determined to shoot out of me

And inhabit the earth

The stars I gathered in my pocket

Are falling out everywhere

I was too careless with the stitches.

My great sun head

Sits on my shoulders

And it is so playful

It has taken a planet

And all these elephants to tame me

The way they came screaming out of the veld

O my mothers!

There was never an Adam and Eve

Divinity

My sun head

Lolling in the waters

Drinking in the rain like diamonds.

I loaned my godhead to so many

Who were happy to claim it

I was subsumed in myths of Adam and Eve,

But here I am

A perfect stranger

Who had given a cabbage too much air

And now it wants to be a flower.

I am as wonderful as beating light

As smashing as red apples.

I’m never depleted

The song of me is singing is the sun rise.

 

I am shaking the stars out of me

These careless craters that fell in my hair..

Don’t move elephants, don't move

Until I untie your tails

Then you can go, screaming your screams.

 

The caterpillar god wants to rival me

Its laughable

It puts on my hue

The stag borrows me too

For that burnish in their brown pelts

O I have to be paint for everything

My light has to be kindly borrowed

To camouflage the game from man the hunter

Who come on spindly legs, with white skin to stalk the beasts

To ruin the rounds of my creation.

O I am an animal in the sun

Thought out of things, to run in myth

As a pale girl transforming into trees

To be a slim boy playing pipes

My animal name is on my lips, but I forget it

My great sun head is pulsing

And I can hear the flowers thinking how to turn me into petals.

Everywhere I am surrendered

In a glorious sharing of my colours

These sea inhabitants slushy in their wet well of water

Are things to be combed out of my hair

And I am priestly with confessions and the names of beasts

Its never complete is it?

My labour of eternal sharing?

 

Without me, there would be dark and no day

Animals wouldn't come out to play

No being has it way with the moon like I do

Carrying it in my mouth, like a desert rabbit that I caught

Feeding its feet in water

Remarking its bloody head

Oh! The moons I have had to catch to keep the world from falling down!

 

 

Brother , sister, snail, I have loved the earth

And beat my breath on it, like fire

 

I have been an animal in the sun

 

I put on the myth of woman

But I knew they could never deplete me

I put on the mask of tragedy

And was woeful

I made the rocks cry, and Orpheus creak in his bones

Rushing to join me

And sing an electric wave

O we were electric!

 

Could I ever have been that baby in a nappy

That woman with sex appeal

How little I had to be, to earn their affection

Suns they knew shone just fretfully

In this country of bad weather

One couldn't be a sun all the time

In delusions of grandeur

If you were not delirious with pain

You were not to be delirious

We cling to our myths

And are stubborn.

 

We do not say, we are animals in the sun

Or that we poured too much oxygen into a cabbage and now it thinks its a flower

We do not see the flowers thinking how they will turn us into petals.

 

We take pictures of the sun not realising we are animals in the sun

We stand in the shade with our heads lowered and are ashamed

We walk in little circles round and round

We believe others have power over us, because we gave them our godhead.

Our words of awe for these our betters

We’ve dressed them in our own silks and lend them our beautiful hues for their hair. 

For we are not worthy of the beautiful day,

The sun does not shine on us,

But in them only , we point and point

At the idols we have made, only

These are fit for the sun

Let us kneel down and pray

obey! obey!

The gods we’ve made.

We are animals in the sun

Our golden masks are trampled underfoot

As we beat our light upon the earth

Because we are good, because we are love

Because we know what the flowers are thinking and stay kind

Because the great ball of lights rolls about in a cradle of bone in our heads

Because the dead rise and eat leaves

Because we must bear the reproach of three blades of grass

We are animals in the sun.

________________________________________________________________________________________________

5 

Minotaur One.

 

(Note:

 

Euripides from the reign of Erechtheus ,Athens, is under attack

from faraway Thrace, and nearby Eleusis and the city doomed unless King Erechtheus sacrifices one of his daughters. this speech from the girls mother Praxithea:

‘We have children on account of this

so that we may save the altars of the gods and the fatherland, the city has one name but many dwell in it. is it right for me to destroy all these when it is possible for me to give one child to die on behalf of all?

 

Here her daughter, whose fate that is to be, that she will 

be sacrificed to the Minotaur

reproaches her mother…)

 ”

“Was I somehow less favoured than

my sisters

Lacking in something, perhaps

That would have inspired filial pity

Did you mark me out young

As a baby even

As suitable food for the Beast

Half man, half bull

They say that some just die at the

first glimpse of him

You mother, have unbound my hair

Mother!

The city calls her to do her duty

Surely, she can give just one child for

all

That child being I!

She pours oil through the long layers

of my hair

Reciting prayers

Mother!

Why me?

I might have asked if that were not to

bring me an answer, perhaps worse

than the fate that now waits me

The others, my sisters, they huddle luckily

together

It is no accident this increasing

seclusion

I notice how they dress more brightly

as if flattering in brighter hues

And looking their best

They can escape the fate laid down

for me

Mother

Its too much of a question to ask

what made me less favoured in your

eyes

“The one you felt you could do best

without

What caused your eyes to fall on me

as choice that would grief you least

of all your daughters

Mother! Mother indeed!

They say the instant you leave the

light and enter the labyrinth the dark

is so deep

The ground is slippery under bare

feet

Even the skin rubbed with balm to

deaden sensation of the mauling to

come cannot ease the hearts horror

Beating madly like a mouse in a

cage with a deadly predator.

Who knows when the strike will

come, only that it is sure to.

Some where beyond the slime and

dark, there is the smell

The odour of his terrible heat

Half man, half beast

You cannot convince me of any of

this , as well you know

Ministering to me with your sensible

words

But you are mad, mad, mad

And bad to do this to me!

I know why you leave me alone with

these impersonal servants

I know why you have separated me 

from my sisters

None have come back from his lair

with ribbons in their hair

Full of the joys of spring, have they?

All mirrors gone but this small one

in which i see my eyes

Those eyes.. you made me

did you think, here a fuck for a

baby to feed to the bull?”

Did you think lying with your husband,

When the times comes, the one I

conceive tonight, will be the one

to sacrifice!

These eyes are skittering and darting

My heart trying to leap out of my

skin

 

That one, that dark servant she daily applies the

deadening balm

So I will feel nothing when the time

comes

 

O the love I lost

in loving you

The time in clinging fondly

My desperate battles on your behalf

Nobody could say a wrong word

about you in my hearing

But I leapt to your defence

All fire

So even my father hesitated

Chose his words with better care

Heard always my unspoken be gentler, 

gentler!

The you that turns me out, now into

terrible darkness

Briskly separates me from my sisters

Fattening them for the market, I used

to tease you

Marriageable girls indeed!

Cynara’s temper! The spite of 

Eleanor!

 

Don’t think you can cover up every

thing with chalk and paint!

 

your own ones!

But was I not your own one too?

Why cast them in light and me in

darkness

Was I less fair?

The smallest

If you must feed one to the Minotaur

Then let it be me

As i was only a mouthful

Being the smallest did that mean I

had less gravitas, less importance?

Because my father once said, I had

more prickles than a porcupine

Because I spoke up for you

Who deserved no thanks

did you secretly feel?

in your innermost heart

You weren’t worthy of any love?

 

No body has returned to describe

this monster

I am free to imagine

The heat, the dark

And hearts may give you upon the

sight of him

 

Everything of mine is now your to

dispose

My singing chests of shells

My favourite rabbit

Yes, I have quietly obliterated all

other evidence of my existence

And consigned them to the fire

 

O you pass me every day as

somebody who is beyond reproach

Doing this good for the city

So bounty, good will come of this

sacrifice of me!

Me! I howl, why me!

Mother

Me, the bringer of your breakfast in

bed

a heart full of pity for you”

“me the bringer home of every lost or

stray creature

In the days when you were kind and

when I said ‘ can I keep it- to every bird with broken wing, you’d say

Humouring me!

How come you changed?

Who wrote ‘kill your own daughter’s the 

sacred precedents of your heart

What persuaded you that this was

your duty

And me! Why me!

Always sticking up for you! Always

protesting for you, in those fights

where I was so unequal

Laughable even, with my small fists

Leave her alone! Leave her alone!

For that you grew me only to feed

me to a monster!

a beast, not even chained

For no one dares

Who hollers and bellows

and must be placated with virgin life

The rest I’m left to imagine

No, no food, take it away

I have no appetite tonight

 

You have torn the sun out of your

own eyes

and laid the bloodied orbs

at this cities feet

Pitiless

This god of yours

Pitiless.

_________________________________________________________________________________

6.

Minotaur 11

 

 

That morning

the first white sail on a bright blue

sea can be seen,

if she asks for us, tell her soon , or

sometime later, we will come to see

her

her parents instruct.

Her women can walk her to the shoreline.

Will you be trouble? he asks, the 

man steering the little craft

Or will you sit quietly?

then I need not bind your hands

 

She nods and sits her unbound hair

loose about her shoulders

her pallor, well you may imagine

her women hurry away,

Won’t they turn back just once to

look

At her long glance at their receding

backs?

How fast it goes this little ship

This impassive stranger

A strong man though, she notes

All muscle and wordless, little 

patience!

Soon, how can it be?

they enter a Black Sea

As black as black can be

Seabirds swing away from them as

though propelled by some invisible force.

And golden fish as big as whales

move lazily in the deeps.

They disembark then

And enter halls of fire

She can no longer hide her terror

As something human, hardly!

anymore

The body of a man

Cloaked in an extraordinary black cloak

a small gold chain, fastening it at the 

neck

Upon the face, she dare not look

Come! A hand grips her and pulls

her furiously along

steaming nostrils

words are bellowed

Come, Now Come!

And pulls her though a deep door

Her feet reluctant, dragging, resisting

at every step

Inside here

She looks upon a face no human

made though half was human!

The eyes flash red in furious display

but then the countenance is quiet as

she takes it all in

Upon the head, two curling horns

But surprising golden curls of hair

that are eye catching 

tactile and delightful

Now rest, and drink this he says.

He pours into a goblet something

warm and sweet

His great sensuous bull lips leer over

her in fond contentment

‘Who knows you might not be torn

and rent

if you are as good as you look’

Who knows, how long I’ll keep you

senseless with terror though you are,

staring at a face the likes of which

you’ve never seen before’

 

By now, the drink has done its work,and so she sleeps

 

She wakes

And finds him sitting there upon the

bed

She keeps her eyes tightly closed.

My mother he says sounding like a

boy who went to Harvard

She was beautiful, but she was a wild

bitch!

yes bitch! he shouts seeing her

shiver

Can you imagine the exchange it was,

The fabled bull ,her husband refused to

sacrifice

Kept in these deep dark rooms

Away from its quota of of good brown cows,

It was my mother, glorious in gold

with little slippers on her feet, her

husband sent to feed it.

Oh it was fondling first, but for gods sake woman!, it was a Bull, and it got

hot

And tumbled her so quickly.

and yes in answer to that question I read unspoken in your eyes

From that glorious union came

me

The head came first

But when the hooves peered out there

could be no doubt.

Oh such a birth scene you never saw

the state of her husband, he was beside himself

He tore his hair and flung her from

him

Muttering slut Filthy slut!

Mmmmm.... that was my mum. You see?

 

But time the speaking beast continued

Time worked on the mind of her husband

It was his favourite bull

And this child lay suckling on his

wives breast

Just like a lamb in springtime

Guzzling like the baby he was

A tuft of golden hair between his

curly horns

And it was clear his besotted wife

thought their offspring beautiful

 

And hooves, why shun you hooves

he looks perplexedly down on the

huddled mass of girl

Curled foetal now in the great fur pelt

of the massive bed

 

Who would have thought he muses 

remembering his infant suckling

then, there would be so much milk

inside one little woman

 

And so he sighs you see.. My complicated life

Has she got a heart of stone this

virgin spawn they sent him?

No heart he returns to her to say,

you got no heart, and pokes

her with a paw.

 

does she have no pity for his

predicament?

But she is sunk somewhere under

the great fur blanket now

and whimpering.

 

What’s that, he thinks oddly moved

that funny noise from that little thing

and yanks her out from

under the blanket.

And these he rubs puzzled hooves

on water running down her cheeks

You bathe in this? he enquires wonderingly

and then he tastes them

Salty, he notes perplexed

 

And then as if a switch is thrown

Words come out his mouth

”

‘There, there’ he grimaces

Patting her back

This weakness he knows comes

from

His mother , this softness!

I want my mother

she is wailing!

O God he howls exasperated ,I told them not

to send me babies!

 

My life, its complicated, he tries again

Surely she will understand

After all his mother never said No

But then he remembers his blood

I’m going to fuck you because I am

part of me a defining part of me is

lustful and virile

he shakes a hoof in her dumbstruck face

 

 

Ugly, some people say I’m ugly

they frighten their children at bed

time , saying go to bed now, or the

Minotaur will come and get you

What say you? he locks her in a look 

from his red eyes

And remember before you speak

Whats done is done

And whats said, can never be unsaid

You’re asking me

Yes I’m asking you

Really?

Really.

You are a beast with tendrils 

between your horns

Can nothing make you fond?

He says, shaking her like a yo yo.

What girl is asked to pledge her troth

before she sees the rest of the house

she asks brightly.

The rest of the house you want to

see?

Yes please, I’ll need something to

occupy me when you are out

A little tour would do me good

 

 

I might also you know be less that

number that you mentioned for my

age

My mother says

I never stop behaving like a child

You got all the right bumps and all

the right curves he looks her over

and decides

 

 

 

 

 

 

11

 

the MInotaur asks his stepdad for some advice

 

Water pours down her cheeks

she's like a river in flood

salty tasting

she weeps you fool she is a girl, did

you learn nothing from your mother

They cry for nothing

it all boo hooey

 

But what will I do?

you know only one thing Im fussy

about

a dry bed

I cannot sleep with a woman

creating pools from her eyes

I swear by Zeus Iv'e seen this sight

myself

and wetting my bed.

Dear God, is it first night nerves

Delirium from the wine or is she

Drunk from the scent of the flowers

the witch who sold me those said

no girl in her right mind could fail

to be pleased.

did she lose her marbles on the 

passage or have they send 

me a dud one

My god there will be hell to pay if they did that!

 

Have you asked her why she weeps

Have I asked her why she does this

Thing?

Ask, and no matter how implausible

the answer

Just humour her

And do what you said, you’d do, show her round the

house

 

 

Why weeps you? I ask her

Her hair is curled in framing curls around her

head

A instant proof of her delight

Her rising ardour! surely

But she just pulls the bed cover over her head and will not answer.

 

Sightings.

 

The fisherman pulling his nets in

from the sea at dawn

Looks up

In the distance

He sees two figures walking close

together

They are oblivious to everything

He strains his eyes to look

Nobody comes here to these

Lonely shores

He makes out a girl

With long unbound hair

At her side a man

Though what is it

its body is a man

but its head is huge

he sees the heavy curl of bone upon

his forehead

From even this distance

The radiance of red globes, his eyes

And the rumbling strength in its

body

its hoofs are hitting the sand

in soft taps.

and suddenly it bellows

The fisherman drops his net

flees....

 

 

and there were other other sightings too

in London

Beside the river Thames

at a small outdoor cafe

That twilight time between

the day and night.

A woman rushing to an late shift

She was a hospital orderly saw

From the distance first,

This surprising thing

A couple, heads close together

Sitting at an outdoor table

The river running black beside them

Night time lovers, who didn’t get 

home, she thought first

But as she came closer

She noticed the colossal head.

And then she saw the hooves that

covered the girl’s hands where they

rested on the table.

And now too, she caught his smell

Of new mown hay of infant milk.

Her eyes fell forever on his face

She would call the police

Of course she would!

But they remained oblivious to her

The huge bulk of the man bull

leaning in on the girl

Her hands held under a delicately

placed but certain heft of hoof

 

 

The attitude of an outlaw she would

say later

A real criminal type , but nobody would believe her.

 

And yet unlikely people who you

would never suspect of poetry

Say how they woke from a dream

Of a beautiful girl

Shaking out on the shore

A net full of birds

They ranging about her head

Rose ringed parakeets, turtle doves, nightingales 

and sparrows

And they were turning, turning on the

shore

The girl, her wild hair

the flying birds, all

Singing....