I never saw the fauna of this world,
only a stare through headlights, a hurried
lurching from verge to verge
on a woodland road;
and, long ago, those places in the roof
where dust had gathered,
shoeboxes lined with eggs and empty
pomegranates drying in a bowl,
mousebones and wicker, chess pieces, muddy coats,
the slender, puppet versions of myself
who played here for a while
then moved away.
At times, when I have nothing else to do,
I think of going up into the highest
roof-beam, like the bridegroom in a hymn,
and bringing something down, an ancient
bird mask, or a broken violin,
or something in a cage that’s still alive
until I fetch it out into the light
and watch it go to powder, teeth and eyestitch
crumbling, and the sound it used to make
extinguished, like the shrieking in the woods
that, once, when I was small, and still awake,
uncharmed me from my bed, before it vanished.