The library makes the small mouse noises Of a patient after defibrillation I have eaten my way through several volumes Of the intimate correspondence Of poets and kings Learning (almost) nothing Except the peculiar bombast and reserve Turned in that intimate, sinister way To bemusing incriminations Of those who know their private thoughts After death will be widely dissected A particularly servile aggrandisement (The fireplace alive with sparks) To providence and The self-important moment Knowing (almost) nothing I gnaw on While grandiloquent lives become The substitute for everyday dissection Limbs splayed and pinned Entrails and misdemeanours Humbly and shamefacedly arranged The map (almost) illegible With that turned half away Scalpel bright But strangely grief-struck grin
