FISHERMAN
The moon-bitch lies in the morning sky
over the tower face-down
and asleep.
Light wind comes off the sea and cools my behind
as I come up the mountain with fish,
while her bronze lover
blinds me from the opposite sky, her
fat, red-faced daddy-boy
watching her sleep in the dawn.
Performing a daily task, this climbing up,
I am caught in the poles of the world
entangled as
if
I were fish
and they held my nets between them.
My feet are slow on the steps.
Last night, I dreamed that the moon
stood on either side of me
and the sun lay cracked and broken
under the world
like an old axle-wheel. But there he is
beaming like a fat idiot
while that pale bitch sleeps on one arm
face down.
This evening, climbing these steps,
he will sit in the opposite sky and warm my can
which is more to my liking.
Flesh mends and grows firm in the sun.
That other was a malignant dream only
and a strange heaven.
Paul Blackburn
