Burnt Offering
Dear Ivor,
The poem that you burned for me
went up, like Ghost Month on the streets of Singapore,
those lick-me-clean sidewalks, littered piously:
toy money for the dead, real sweets, and cardboard
iPhones… Such worldly spirits, as acquisitive
as us. And why not? We have life to spare
and stuff. I’ve kept your soup can, and the final twist
unburned. Some ash. The moment, though, is… where?
The sun came out. The charring edge unpicked
itself; the flame was nothing we could see.
The words curled up, translated into air
like this: a sonnet, dissolution in a strict
form, knotted matter coming graciously
undone. So we curate the breath. Take care.
for Ivor Davies, artist of destruction
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