Sarah Slean
"Dark Room"


The town is crouching
A field of windmills waits, their stupid heads turning
Stirring the night’s bath.

Bundles of vapour hang over the factories
Whose lights blink and loll like sleepy eyelids
The moth in the lighthouse breathes with its prehistoric parts.
I feel the night snicker.

It was here,
Tangled among the litter and old valentines
I found my coma leaking
A branch punched a hole
In the quiet that was keeping me
And
Suddenly
All the sleep fell out

Rolling over the hills in a dark warm wave
Vices of the orphan choirs threaten to overwhelm
Speeding through the skeletons of trees
LyricsPulling their bodies bent


The wind’s terrible symphony tore out my longing by the toes
My ears were emptied and renamed.
The balm slid off like a bubble of oil and
Died pitifully under the choirmaster’s heel
I was gutted and clinging on like a dish rag -

But so on fire with believing

That when the storm introduced itself

I put my finger in its mouth