Jal Nicholl


However

Stack however many stones
none will get oedema,
regardless of fifty coats
they’ll still be cold

A black bunting of ivy
decorates them, awaiting
a pageant it rises and falls
like a snail

While the well sealed urn
takes the weight of a cloud
the way the acute end
of an eggshell takes a bible

A seed loses its tail, puts
down legs full of oedipal rage,
kicks a hole in the wall, cries god
and bites into a lemon

And in the botanic gardens
an oak blooms forever
whispering as it reads
in latin naturally

As a homeless man draws
isometric houses—
porticoes, turrets, spires, moats
in the pavement’s matrix

return to SHAMPOO 29