Ecce Ancilla Domini

Hot night: Mother is shaking down
the mercury. It rolls and clicks like
little dead sleigh-bells. Off to bed you go,
my dear. I must finish embroidering
this pomegranate. How many seeds. Can you
count a pomegranate's seeds and what if
a raven gobbles them                                   Child, you're raving
Nightgowned neck to ankle in white linen.
When the door shuts I struggle

out of the sheets (as a child I played in them
I thought them sails and the bed a ship)
which are become mantles of burning

sand. Knees hugging a camel's back I ride
over ergs, saffron dunes rippled. The thirsting curves
of rib bones. I thirst and the winking stars
are milk droplets. My hair spills over my pillow
tendrils of burnt sugar, on my neck strands
of amber kelp left stranded.
High tide. What I wouldn't give
for water, what I wouldn't give for a breeze

who is this man sitting on my windowsill

I sit up. Mouth a hot plum                    Who are you?
He speaks a language I don't understand

the wreath of snow-lilies I embroidered yesterday.
He shawls my shoulders. I didn't
didn't ask for this.  Ecce                     white flames at his heels
ancilla                           eyes like sleeping doves                Domini
kisses my forehead his lips leave a smear
that luminesces, a crushed glowworm
I didn't ask

why I slept under sheets grown suddenly cool

I woke

I felt a goldfish
flopping and splashing 
in my belly

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