Christmas at Christchurch

poem from The Pagan Field 1996

            I feel translucent

            a man of marble skin

            as if dreaming my motions

            every step a tread in water

            each reach of my hand

            a ghost grip touches

            but nothing holds and yet

            I clutch these stones and

            iron spear barricades

            as a sea-snail would the bedrock

            for this is my folly

            to hug close the masonry of charity

 

            I feel nothing

            no remorse runs down my arms

            to my useless wrists

            no rage

            twists my mouth into rabid snarl

            no pleasure lifts my face

            from the footfalls

            of those celestial beings

            bustling above

 

            not even a soaked black wall

            on which I am a shadow

            penetrates my deadened hide

 

            I feel grotesque

            I am a gargoyle of flesh and bone

            sown into the fabric of these

            towers with closed doorways

            that form broken arch homes

            for broken things

            but

 

            no longer am I broken

            I have embraced

            the cold and hunger

            of my mouth and my soul

            I am free of this place

 

            Yet

 

            here I am still

            here for you to see

            if you can stomach

            to see me