Washing glasses in the sink
and the first thing she knew was this

Io a scatter of wool and its own litter
the skull stares out at the road below: socket rings 

Aztecs used cocoa beans as currency;
attending countless wives,
the wealthy chiefs would fortify their Strength

I dream you, and you come to me
intact, in focus, indiscreet, mouthing
the sweetest lies as if we cared.

It could take from Monday to Thursday
and three horses. The ink was unstable,
the characters cramped, the paper tore where it creased.

Henry Ford boasted
there would be no Egyptian mummies in his museum.

Horses with wings and horses with shoes.
White stallions sacrificed to Roman gods.
Scythian kings buried with fifty horses.

Science was a walk in the woods
Where my neighbour's dad did his lecturing.
It was a tiny metal cannister, kept

What was I thinking of (not Tintern
Abbey, that's for sure, more likely you—
mean: we were on honeymoon)

His interest in blades of any cut
is purely amateur, he tells me. But