Threadwords

She threads words
through the scraps of her life
like a hunter
piecing together skins
from rabbits he has killed -
fashioning a quilt for his rough bed.

She is ready at last
For the task
Of remembering and dismembering
Crude, bloody, comfortless
With no guarantees.

The light of the sun
That falls on her
Is sharp
Merciless

It needles her
Like the quest for truth

Dark glasses cannot allay it.
It will be felt.
It must pierce.

A sleepier self
Wants to close her eyes,
bask spread-eagled
oblivious

But the watcher
Strung-out on adrenalin
Is pointing to the clock,
Skewed from too much delay, like the one in Dali’s painting.

Its incessant tick sounds in her ears
as deafening as tinnitus.

There is so little time,
She mutters

Her skin parches across her face
With a new dryness.

‘You, you, you,’
said the poet in her dream,
like an archer drawing a bow.

A sister
Asks her
To be who she is

who is she
to deny her?

30.5