Extinguished, silent poems
brood in the closed room.
Unsubtle, heavy the
clues Ariadne lays
(remembered wrongs
pock the tortured manuscript).
Taking fear as lover, close-
mouthed in utter darkness
the cord meanders – Grimmelshausen,
I sweat thy words!
The profiled, impassive
garment of skin,
ovary’s parched pain
a skull’s containment.
Pyre-builder or poet,
the Muse buried alive.