WASHING She hangs her washing line along the street. She lives next door, though we have never met. She pegs up sopping hides, and hidden thus What lends them shape, and makes voluminous Her sleeve selves, published in the outward strut Of those whom this late hour holds hearth-side, housed. Her washing line hangs taut along our street: Tight-lipped, a public smile as, passionate, Ghosts in soaking trousers take a neat Bow, to no applause. They call up blades Out of thin air, and fall on them, and this Macho act goes unlamented, wanting blood. Her washing line is nothing permanent. She takes it down, the clothes go in; next door Is sealed apart. Yet some nights tears are heard To slip the walls that keep us from our neighbours: The least of sound, unsealing self as, fresh perturbed, That girl’s gaunt spirit shucks austere composure. If we could but extend a hand, as winds Caress what linen leaves, on lines, of limbs, Like deadeyes for the lanyard stays and shrouds By which our shipshape selves resist disclosure; If, worlds apart, our brains could trick a word To speak the clarifying and detergent censure To beatings that heap walls foursquare around Grief steep as stars, our poetry had purpose. To her these words intend, that girl un-housed At next-door-distant hearth-side; washing sense In lines that can’t amend a hurt. This art Must be a wind, caressing hopeless hearts With unseen hands: a discipline, or dance Of broken sounds, breezed into consonance. PD
Posted on: Fri, 20 Sep 2013 01:47:47 +0000