Shrieking Fort Poem by Emmanuel George Cefai

below the shrieking fort
of the night-windows
lighting
then going off
then again lighting
there
was a ford that shrieked
and from it
the fort shrieked.

voices whispered
sometimes slow though
always audible
sometimes more and
more
rising to pitch
as in quarreling.

then
the walls burnt
of the old fort
fires on the stairs of
old
and on the secret staircase
winding.

but
in the fort abandoned
that no one dwelt
save a few skeletons
and shrouds.