trout

recombination

Michele Leggott

the digital media specialist
shone a very bright light into
the cupboard     can I make you see
the bones     how big they were
the sudden cartography
of that display in its glass case
purpose-built     free-standing     every
detail visible     we could have walked
around them in the museum     almost
able to touch     to count     to marvel
to read whatever was there before
the darkness of the cupboard
there were marks on the smaller
of the two     the one we wanted to be
the one we were looking for
but there was no telling     only a curious
need     I was going to say desire
to run a hand over the double lobes
to right the upside down head
to get us out of the dark     the way
Dorothy Pound stands in the garden
at Brunnenburg beside the Hieratic Head
set to catch the rays of the setting sun

a famous photograph
and the one I can't find     but see clearly
the poet's funeral boat setting out
across the quiet water to the island
shrouded     earth's winter confetti
blowing about in the bitter air
a lume spento     that time
of going into the dark     and the bones
gone into the fire or the great
aquifer of memory     of knowing
where to look and who to call
m'amour m'amour     a wild morning
on the south coast with the island
visible above black rock terraces
and the wind taking words
from the little knot of people
we say bidding farewell     meaning
remember this place and that time
Olga Rudge sitting beside the body
in the camera ardente     seeing
the white stone she will commission
and bring to the gardens of the dead