All along it was a fever
that came down with me.
I came to burn the witch
the simmer and twitch of madness
but firewater
does not burn her clean
on the end of the mourning
in the middle of the afternoon
you are a balm to me
down in the meadow
scrubland
undergrow
I cannot keep my head straight
and this old jacket
pulls arms across my heart,
and bends me out of shape.
I barely sleep at all these days.
We rock back words on grey granite waves
clint clamberers
and the scramble of brambles
bracken and lichen
the gorselit fires of
meadow sides
and stingy nettles
what which we we walk amongst
with wrists that grasses graze.
My palms listen to the bark and
moan of bitter holly trees
our jabber and jumpers punctuated with their leaves
while on the salted breeze
gypsy jinny-joes alight like thieves
I can’t look you in the eye,
but the silence we drink for a short while
before hills rolled out like tides
brings a cool white forearm to my
fevered forehead
settles my slacken jaw in a smile
and I swoon back into the sanctity of it all
and the holy petticoat immodesty
of wildflowers
wildflowers
wildflowers
Sionnachaí 