Moving

I stare
at the “last night in this place”
it stares straight back through corrupted glasses
transparency is a lost cause
of fingerings and other prints.

A copy of Ngugi, almost forgotten
on a shelf, dust on its ‘Petals…’*, conjures
pluck in its solitude of the old woman
the rare breed who raised her long skirt
well above her short white-haired head
and “shat a mountain at the school”
leaning on her hook-headed walking stick

I catch
a glimpse of a phantom
about to do the unimaginable
in the alfalfa shade, moonlight streaming
through leaves, crotchets a witch’s lace veil.

Faded footprints emerge, bribe their way
over the grey mass between my ears, I shake my head
markings in monochrome, snake on loam soil
drawing closer, becoming bolder like a daring thief
takes a break, drifting about the veranda

I envisage
daybreak, the night
making a hurried departure through the back
door stands open to the odour of decay
drifting from our overloaded jalopy nearby
which needs oiling but will have to pass
our wallet is slim, the officer’s wet palms held out.

The moon, ever so incorruptible cries tears of silver
into each foot-shaped planting station, the enlightened
will find something to harvest as we leave at dawn
for that place laying somewhere between black and white.

*In reference to Petals of Blood

Also by this poet:

• Hands Down in Issue 1