Seasons of turbulence

Seasons of turbulence         windswept past

 

and now     the comparative impression of balance

 

(illusory, or playfully ironic, or

                        painfully untrue)

 

                  a pair of whistling ears and

salt-burned lips and trying to hold on

                              – with the same hand –

to a cigarette  a writing implement 
                              compassion  a banknote

the beats of the bar  the compass

                              points and general tralala

 

when autrefois stood witness

                          in stained glass      tachycardia

on the steps of Monmartre  and one

                         meaningful sacrifice in the abattoir

carried the fire far

 

                 And so at the still point

                                    of the turning etcetera

Sisyphus rolls his orchestra

                        rising through recitative to obloquy and aria

 

down the hill to the shore    where Death shakes manacles

           

bangs knuckles at the door of Ocean             and the spray falls

     

            as feathers over sleeping forms

 

(pools of chloroform nearby, circumscribed in bluebells

 

            ringing     [reflected,

 

                  shivering])