The Innisfree Poetry Journal

www.innisfreepoetry.org

by Stephen Devereux

East Wind


Brings the arctic syllables of geese and swans,

polishes the Milky Way, scours the beaches clean

of dried starfish, dogfish eggs and plastic bags,

comes stinking of tundra and tyranny,

blows strands of hair from drowned girls

round the church steeples, the hotel flagpoles,

shrivels the last scraps of juice in the trees,

dries to the pale grey of the sky the boards

of the fishermen's huts, cracks their knuckles

open, comes laden with lost ideas, shouts

down empty high streets, bends shop windows,

leans on the backs of mourners above open