You’re
By Stuart Barnes
Published 9 November 2023
after Sylvia Plath’s ‘You’re’
a cardinal wing tilting sideways for
a sodden-spined god on an airy desk.
Perturbed by Neptune, a centaur.
A volatile icy body pour
-ing its hair up into picturesque
churn. An unfeeling Antarctic core.
Foam cartwheeling the rafts of the Coeur
d’Alene. A pilgrim bottle, grotesque
-embellished. The mortar and pestle of moon-lore.
The portable barre, the Adagio floor,
the most fluid arabesque.
Snow crunching beyond the big war
-drobe. Whetstone of fastest wild boar.
County Waterford’s Romanesque.
Pearl the albino raven’s caw.
My lucky charm, an anointed rabbit paw.
Apollo, miniature, Pythian, statuesque.
The white of my eye, my dropping jaw.
Only a whale, not a metaphor.