THE MEMORY OF TIMBER Poem by Jen Hadfield

by want -
as in ‘I want you' and

‘I want to write' - I mean
as if the sap in the floorboards candled

and began to flow - bruises freshening
round the cleats and congealed grain

loosening like lava around the nails and knots
to giddy in lees where flour-gold would gather

were floorboards a river


I want -

no wonder the cat skips and shivers
and stares up wildly

into empty corners -

the knots scorch the shirred flesh
in their readiness

to spout scaled limbs -
and are the shape of sparrow's

breasts puffed up against
a snow-strafed wind