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Poetry
by Annick MacAskill
Waterfowl
Everything else can be left up to the gods:
a week of white nights in the temple have done me
no good. At market, they say my brother
has slackened the family purse strings
for his mistress’s
embrace, a merchant undone by a collage
of lipstick and black bra straps,
by purple guile and lace. I will not sing
of war or empire –
this time the Muse has shown me a battle
of bones erecting their defense in quicksand.
The boy will find time a fierce opponent,
risk becoming
commonplace: a toupéed sea-farer lost in a woman’s sighs
like the feeble bittern, alone
among the reeds and splashing
fervently
at the sound of a hunter’s call, his wings
drumming something like passion against the skiff
as the river’s mouth
widens.
[Distillate © HA&L + Annick MacAskill | {from the Greek bios} -- the course of a life.]
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