Sunday 
 
 
More often he's tripping over syllables, gets up 
draws the curtains shut. Holes are appearing in the 
country where he used to be the enemy. His stories 
 
are unfolding themselves with increasing unease. 
There are his many swarms of butterflies, 
flying up from trees in India. 
 
I can't put a date on it, only the death species 
who hide here under glass. Discolored and silent 
they hang next to the stairs. There is the phoenix 
 
that listens when the subject is about strange skies 
over strange cities. It rises to become grey ashes 
and we think about: 
 
Sunday afternoon, empty glasses, origami. 
You take the napkins from the table and hope 
for swans as accelerators of time.