Acts

With regard to these acts: removal of clothing,
nudity in front of females and before prayer,
the belly a heap of wheat set about with lilies,

a brood of men with bushy locks, black as raven,
the shaving of beards O daughters of Jerusalem,
exposure to extreme temperatures, hot or cold, short

shackling to an eye-bolt on the floor,
spikenard and saffron, calamus and cinnamon,
three hundred and fifty incidents of self-harm,

a garden inclosed, a spring shut up, a fountain sealed,
hoods, goggles, lap dances during interrogation,
fear of dogs, the use of dogs; the acts in question

were perpetrated by known government officials,
their teeth a flock of sheep, evenly shorn.

      Awarded 3rd prize in the TLS/Foyles Poetry Competition 2007

The Modified Mercalli Scale of Earthquake Intensity

I

Beep-beep: a zebra finch
motoring between perches,
a peaceable age of entwined fish.

II

Sensitive souls on upper floors
with seafood pliers,
demolishing crab claws.

III

A family spirit
rattles her own portrait,
scrawls moustachios on it.

IV

Parked cars rockabye with lovers.
With lamb's blood, the governor
daubs his front door.

V

As every pendulum fails
the sleepers awaken. Church bells
peal themselves.

VI

Citizens flee the bullring.
Radios play 'Begin the Beguine',
shopkeepers cave in.

VII

Architectural ornaments
crumble; the veil is rent.
A wild pitching of press tents.

VIII

Branches crack, a tower falls.
Water levels
rise like mercury in dead wells.

IX

Earth is open for business.
Crumbs on broken dishes
marauded by zebra finches.

X

The governor struggles to adapt:
a crab-claw hand,
the whispering toenails of a rat.

XI

Rail tracks grow serpentine,
cockroaches bide time.
There is cake, there is wine.

XII

Tidal meadows, ghost towns.
Communications down,
the angels elect their new thrones.

      Shortlisted in the TLS/Foyles Poetry Competition 2007

A.B. Jackson © 2010