Scent; Universe

Scent

I think of all the shape-shifters
moving in and out of their bodies.

At once: a wolf’s sharp face
under the moon’s gleam
and then the bud of a rabbit’s.

Paws make imprints in the snow,
I hear their cool crunch as they travel.

Some nights my imagination wanders
as they go from species to species,
the air all thick with unusual scent.

A slender man bends to become a leopard,
an octopus walks out of the sea.

Universe

Let the soul of a man take the whole universe for its body.
—Simone Weil

I learn to become helix,
a skein of orbit drawn to the speckled sun.

A fired whisper,
then the skin of star, bloom of organs,
your call of bone, the nub of muscle.

I look for half-built constellations
when dust and vapour become soul.
You grow lamp-lit.

With an ear tuned to your pulse
I am counting each earthly hour

knowing the wind will soon set sail,
taking its ghosts with it.
What remains shall be ours.

© Libby Hart