NIGHT'S SPY GLASS

A prize-winner in the 2011
Welsh Poetry competition

On the edge of silence, night
does her own thing, peers down
from a thousand quicksilver eyes,
finding us, snug as sardines,
in our wide double bed.

She can’t be doing with our
lazy innocence, our looking-forward
to years of togetherness, snaps
imperious fingers, calls for
ever-stronger lenses, magnifies

a heart-problem here, a dodgy
knee there, pulling the rug
from under our complacency.
She shows her teeth, conjures
chaos music from overhead wires,

gives black-bud trees dancing
shoes, sits back and screws
a spy-glass into every star.  She
sticks pins into each tender part.
Try this on for size, she says,

watching our every move
with clinical detachment.  It
takes all our energy not to cry out,
simply stroke the other’s
skin and live till morning.