A Foot, a Snail
I drag my coattails timely
out of the egg, slog among the dead.
I review my days
and find inside them things I never
have made: my long convenings, how
I spurn the earthworms’ pulled faces. Clouds
boil up and boil down, on my
furrowed cheeks the mum-breath,
its warmth, its breadth. Folded mist and low sun.
Parked at the end of each lane is
a trailer, a plough, a muck spreader.
Within the compass of the wren falls
the stab. Upon the threshold my measured
foot bears the look of something edged, seeks
succour of crumbs. I doze sills, butt
and loosen doors. Through the sensational forest
seek for liquors, potent serums
of mortality, certain deliveries
of gold. A livery of gold. My fortresses
are smell and touch and sweep
of antlers, branches that weep with rain.
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Giles Goodland is a UK based poet and lexicographer. His last book was Of Discourse (Grand Iota, 2023). Giles Goodland (grandiota.co.uk)
Stone Poetry Quarterly 