Marie, maigre, marais.
Marine inlets pocked
with drowsing flies
engage the afternoon
of a faun.
The meadow seethes
with numbered stones,
bleached, whitecap bones.
Sandycove, chaleur, sorbonne.
She is hauled
in, shivering, by
her pigtail, over
the frosted gunwale
her frayed shift.
Keychain, rosary, spaniel.
Hidden by leaves,
the vampire excess,
stolen, stuttering words,
as though shouted
across stony fields
after the boys
have run away.
At road’s end
the executioner’s serene
white cottage. He
lives here, idle.