THE DAINTY MONSTERS
Michael
Ondaatje
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Elizabeth – a Slight Ache
The golden king eats with his fingers,
mimes instruments, lays food
like a broken bird in his mouth.
Blood brown men eat
arms stretched high over them,
bodies bent, jaws
angled to catch rice gracefully.
My sailors hurdle and sway
cupped round boiled drink
.................................and I,
to betray thinking,
fall from my chair to cold stone.
Birds in petticoats
race, are amazed,
giggle at my language
at the rough torn face
bent round my mind,
creased from inside, brown
from thinking of the sun.
Crystal at a dinner
smothered by a hand, breaks.
Holding wine, blood in my palm.
Hold out the wound. Birds
in shrouds run, exclaim.
I prize pain like this.
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