after Kathryn Madill's History of Ireland

Even these hands built stone walls, & dug the earth she lies bound on.

I kneel-scrabbling for a hold on


these bigger stones, gritty dirt


peeling skin back above my fingers'


rising moons. She tilts up & leans


against my right thigh, a bride's


weight-heaved to top dead centre,


then I'm standing up!


My pulse hip hop direct


to the bone house shakes walls,


& from the stone held close


in a crumpled jute gown, earth hails


& a worm twists, flexing spirals &


I stagger ...

Her head lolls, both tides drawn down
& long gone-sucked within the navel ...

I stand still & a ground mist breathes


an ache into my arms ...


I can't remember her name


& bleak Ireland mourns


with a drizzle ...

just then her mitochondrial DNA resonates,


& a dew beady spider's web-


trembles ...


& DAVE SAYS

Iron rods frame triangles


& these make an arch


over our morning place.
We have squatted with


our backs toward


a corrugated iron wall
& the workplace

door remains ...


locked.
We idly unravel ...


all that's left of the night.


It's five before eight.

*

& Dave says " The lightning


in the clouds over


the Southern Alps last
night was knitting the sky,"


& I say


"Yeah, it was like

fluorescent tubes ...


going-zzzzachct!"


& Dave says "YeahI"

& I say "We just need


sombreros & ponchos now


to be Mexican peasants!"

*

& Dave says "Yeah, drinking tequilaI"


& I'm thinking Viva Zapata!


Fuck Porfirio Diaz!
& later ... what


sort of deities might go


zzzzachct in the clouds...
at night?


& what did Ovid


find agreeable in Tomis...

after dark?


& Julia ... did they?


& Dave ... what did Dave really say?

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