Prudence in Hell 051

Repossession

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"The sight of a feather in a peacock’s tail, whenever I gaze at it, makes me sick!"
—Charles Darwin, in a letter to Asa Gray (3 April, 1860)

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This one clotted like old blood.
I took several stabs at it. I wrote it in spurts.
To you, who met me at my most sacred,
I bear the imprint of violence. 

I tried to clean up that swamp of lacunae 
with grandpetrine infills of language. 
No cities arose is a rose from it. 
I was lent form and asked for my terrors.

Epiphytes, like birds of paradise, were once
presumed to lack foothold, to be 
—as they say—
                 not for purchase. 
But I have feet of my own making

which I have pulled out 
                 from under your sleeves. 

And cut.