Trewent
1.
My favourite lecturer used to slide
through the department in his Inuit socks,
at parties wouldn’t realise he was theorising
with his wine glass on his head.
“Change,” he always said, “happens at the edge,
the frontline, tideline, the thick line
that sparks a fight and then, perhaps,
a kiss. This is where we know who we are”
he said, “by seeing who we are not”.
2.
Along the boundary hedge
is a thick border of chatter:
dragonflies skim through symphonies of flowers.
A touching racket of glitz-bugs,
bumbles backing out of foxgloves,
helicoptering away. Canvassing.
Bartering. A market of all-sorts,
poking out sloes, haws, handfuls of
who-will-buy-my-sweet-red-roses?
3.
But here, there’s just a twisted wire, spiked,
catching farmers’ plastic. A flagging daisy
chokes on bindweed. A sign – Keep Out –
is raw and stark. A law in black and white.
Galvanized. And now it’s everywhere: razor wire,
electric fences. We make our way around them,
trailing like herds
like souls split from our minds,
no longer knowing if we are inside or out.