deep as the North star,
I can be neither familiar nor close

margravine of desert parishes;
places become crop-mark and
                        soil-shadow,
the lazarus-rattle of dried heather
as the wind slitters off from the Purbecks

adumbratio
I am veiled in a churchyard,
masqued at tide-times, a chimæra
vitrified at the window, eclipsed
by “disastrous twilight”

soul of all metals I am, but
“in a raw state” dreaming
the black stone of the self;
an idea seeking form as when,
above pondwater,
the ectoplasm of a projected leap
waits for a frog to flow into it


a few ounces of gorse flowers
and several parts each
        gravel, sand, clay
spread by glacial drift
        gravel-caps
plateaux separated by
slope-clays, loam-clenched fistfuls of
                 shrub-tree
        cremation burials
an internal grit of crushed flint,
fragment of flanged bowl with
        painted wavilinear bands:
my stride devours the vell of the heath where
splinters of history continually discharge
at the surface of the present
       impatient   tracing the viper's keel,
slough of a lizard caught in rootwire
       a perfect replicant
Belovéd exorcist, what shall we call
this place of our rencounter?
                        (“Bruaria?”)
where we have never been is real

I have been pricked for a witch
        MERETRIX
                        INSPIRATRIX
I can be your Turkish Knight
each corner of my mouth
as keenly cut as the point of a spear:
tiger-beetle, subtle in beauty
though I blaze under full illumination
brilliant in colours and
armed from head to heel
in gorget
        and cuirass:
                        Venus as a boy

you cannot hurt me more
than I have hurt myself:
I have lanced my flesh with barbs of Ilex
burned my tongue with bearberry acid
tested flint on the edge of my palm
driven hawkfeather quills under my nails;
blooded, maculate in purples
I have prepared for my initiation
fought and fought to be
                        a splendid woman

I will match you blow for blow
fain would I pierce, fain would I be pierced
infold and be infolded
eat and be eaten
flee and remain still
I loved a man once, and now
I love you
your thumb rowing strongly over my clitoris
                        moving
from between my legs
to anoint my lips and cheeks
with my own chrism

swollen, we are twin horns
you standing at the mouth of a shining-walled labyrinth
where you can do what you want
do what you want
put your hands all over me
                        and in me
o to be
o to be
to be your stunning
                        guide

you promised a thing not possible
a vessel of gold
twelve cities with a market in each of them
wrenskin shoes
a dress of wild silk
revolution and philosophy
you promised me and
you said a lie to me
now it's you are the lonely bird
throughout the moors and
that you may be without a mate
until you find me
                        again:

novembertime
when I will write my love for you in
fire across the sky;
chrysographer among stars like
flaming bees extinguished by the rain that
threads me back into the heath
sewn down to its magnetic core:
your port in my heavy storm
harbours the blackest thoughts, the
prow of my face cuts
        through its breath-cloud
I will name my ship
                        VICTRIX
neither life nor death dilute me:
out of suffering may come the cure



                                        Eustacia Vye; ‘The Return of the Native’,
                                        Egdon Heath, now Puddletown Forest