Swifts and Nightjars., poetry from Ermine Strill.,

Swifts and NightjarsElizabeth,

the doves come and I scatter


my guilt likegrain for them.





I am having visions again.


They appear in wild processions


from the mouth of my father's


crumbling poetry into my


mothers arena of pain.





they are propaganda for sin.

My throat is full

of wishbones and brail.



I watched you drown robins


in whiskyand I have built


a glass bottomed boat.





It will be my arc


(my coffin, my arc)


until my secrets turn


to milk in my mouth.





The shadows are still so bloated.


I have tried to make ghosts bleed.


Now winter has come


and the spiders are spitting on graves.





Finding grace is like catching


hummingbirds with bare hands.





He says that he has changed,


and I have become a chrysalis


of vultures, a pillar of salt.





Elizabeth your eyes look different,


they are still in your face


like sleeping scarab beetles.





Is this my punishment?


Have I not loved enough?


There is a child in my arms


and a fox in my heart.




Ermine Strill, Edinburgh.,