Grey rain,
cloudy dew rises
from your surrogate mother,
earth, brown & dark as skin,
as sack carrying trauma
& this life, a bird
quivering in the nub
of its little existence,
cradles me against my spine,
my shadow stretched taut
as a tree in the soft lamp
of half blind windows.
I mean the curtains leave
little of the world
& you can hear the scrape
of voices against the rim
before plunging
like a fading shout
which echoes & echoes
& echoes in all the stiff
jointed dance of my feverish
dream—drum, feet, sweat
& holy body holding music
in the shape of boys
who exiled & girls
who brought them home
briefly, each nocturne.
