So the one book
that was all Leofric’s
Donation survives,
chopped at by drunks
slopping boozy cupmarks
to be opened, spread
to the fingers’
handsbreadth following
script into mouth speech
where some monk had
marked up the page sighting
his pen as the ploughman
sights on the hawthorn
& mutters his song to himself.
The exile puts out,
storms break on the stone hillside
seabirds broad out their feathers
through these vowels
that reach us thinking
how come it’s so late so early?