The moon is a blind eye, milk white,

moths do not fool around it, unlike street lights

where I still sense the dark side of a lover

and the breeze with its touch of fever.

Colliers walked this path, through these ings, towards a much thicker darkness,

the red burn of tobacco, a twist of smoke, the sound of good boots.

Underneath a flab of bank the river moves, its dark hide flinches round the gaping mouths of fish;

driftwood stretches out an arm.

Gnarled hawthorn I remember in April thick with blossom, a false snow,

silent under boots, warm between fingers.

First published in Books Ireland. Runner Up in the Capricorn International Competition.

1. The line-cut image above by Dave Wilders accompanied the poem in the book: Camaradarie of Dust

She stares into a constellation:

crumbs on the breadboard

next to the knife.

She could plough a finger through those stars,

taste them, the bitterness in the burnt ones.

She moistens the tip of a finger,

her baby's, places it into Orion,

takes it up to her knuckle

into her mouth.

Lips close,

the tip of her tongue on the tip of his finger;

the smell of his skin.

She pulls her stare from the furrow

through the crumbs on the breadboard

next to the knife, looks into his eyes:

the darkness of the pupils

too vast to unravel.

First published in Stand magazine.

Intoxication

He took a bottle of rum, drank

from the neck, the way he'd tried with her

till she stiffened, pulled away, took a few paces to face the ocean-

waves, breath on breath, consumed in the sand, mauled the coastline gently.

He followed, offered the bottle:

a swig fuller than his, a swig more.

She turned and faced him:

           The easiest thing in the world for you is a woman, you think?

           Not You.

           Not me

She strode barefoot, bare-legged,

from the empty bar to the empty beach,

into the sea, sank its deep persuasion to her thighs.

He followed, stood beside her.

           If you have to maul someone, do it like this, like the ocean.

He slipped an arm about her waist and let the waves

draw them together, pull them apart.

Inside, the rum warmed her; she purred a little

as her feet sank further.

He sank deeper, but

did not move.

Justine

She's a reaf,

a strange scented song,

awakes as a moth from its skin, moves

on the pads of a cat,

            her eyes are lethal:

            water round a trailing hand,

can be taken

under the glare of a sun:

a bulb, a crocus cut

naked by the turn of

of a spade, stares

into the moon's sunken eyes,

lets helpless strangers pass fingers

through her hair, whispers

with the breath

of long-eared grass

across bare thighs,

wave after wave

clutching, turning pebbles

on an ebbing tide

             her walk

             distinct as a voice.

From A Net of Strange Voices

Plate 1, David Wilders