The memory of buildings: I had vined
myself into the bricks, clambering up
the staircase into the heat of that closed room
and I was in the ballasts, the old pink paint
on the weathered wall. Each breath held my scent.
We were all turned out in the end. Some stayed close
made a home without a memory of owls
a little stretch up the road. I was driven
place to place, an eerie wanderer, a comet.
They supplied a new model, less willful
with better handling: I’m sure you don’t miss me,
engraved talismans with the proper phrasing
to send me on. In dreams you feel my palm
against the pane, your heart aches to let me in
and moor me somewhere with walls and sturdy doors —
White Cat Grove 