Meadow Lane
Under the fingernail,
the child was already growing green.
She kept touching the day
where the fox fur and the meadow clots,
the lane she took -
a slight from the village,
in jade and moss damp cobbles.
It would turn, the hex gild of chlorophyll,
unbalance her scuffed patent shoes,
her school books slipping out of reach -
the pain, the bowels of it and what someone had said, counting the weeks.
She picked herself over the yellow-rattle tops,
her grey dress, her limp hair;
two days unwashed in the sweat of April
and her doll hands bent the bough,
found a spot
to lie down with knees parted.
(Her breath met her each time, unsure –
a circumcision of her age.)
(Her breath met her each time unsure –
the felt of rain on her brow)
(Her breath met her each time unsure –
a cobweb screaming in the rake)
(Her breath;
the torn leaf, was tread marked.)
A purse lay scattered; a tender blot of
a textiles project she had yet to finish,
and she closed her eyes,
the heavy spring descending to press.
(Her breath -)
The trees clawed inside her
with needles and the frays of cotton,
and fever fell at full tilt -
warm browns, thick reds;
they tossed in the air and scratched –
her school ribbons and her apron twisted,
left in the blood of tiny white feet.
