Index of First Lines

I

She is snake, she is wind, she is

Leaf, her cry is a knock

On the door and I let her enter.

Her face is like paper

On which something has been written

And erased many times. The door closes.

She sits in an armchair, leans

Forward, and gives me a ring of white hair.

She wants me to keep it

Till she calls again.

It’s half-past four in the morning

And I’m still awake. The wedding music

Stops for a while. Whiteness

Returns to the walls.

Old woman, how can I be

Astonished by sunlight when it breaks

So evenly?

A condemned building

Cannot lean on its shadow.

II

She enters through a door

In the kitchen,

I pretend I’m asleep.

She sits at the foot of my bed,

And I notice her hands

Resemble her father’s. It’s past eleven.

The sun has risen despite the rain.

The birds get up

But stay close to their

Nests. Soon it will be dark.

Inside my mouth

I see a farrier’s anvil.

Old woman, tell me

Where adamant is found.

The birds’ feet are tied,

They have chipped voices,

And I’ve sold my compass

For a clay medallion.

III

She is an elf, she is a wand, she is

A goblin. She comes as she pleases.

She no longer taps like the rain,

She stands in the window

Like sunset.

On Sundays she opens

A book of charts

And turns a page. I watch

The edges of a continent run

Into the colours of the sea.

Old woman, tell me about the death

Of mercury. Tonight I’ll enter

Your mutable country

Where the land doesn’t tighten

Over water like a shoe and the moon

Spills all its light

On the sky. I touch my words

And they rise to be near your empty hands.