The Owl Flower

Big terror descends.

A drumming glare, a flickering face of flames.

Something writhes apart into a signal,

Fiendish, a filament of incandescence.

As it were a hair.

In the maelstrom’s eye,

In the core of the brimming heaven-blossom,

Under the tightening whorl of plumes, a mote

Scalds in dews.

A leaf of the earth

Applies to it, a cooling health.

A coffin spins in the torque.

Wounds flush with sap, headful of pollen,

Wet with nectar

The dead one stirs.

A mummy grain is cracking its grimace

In the cauldron of tongues.

The ship of flowers

Nudges the wharf of skin.

The egg-stone

Bursts among broody petals –

And a staggering thing

Fired with rainbows, raw with cringing heat,

Blinks at the source.