Strappado
I was thinking about back then
before I thought I
heard chords on a flute
when there was no young bird
beating its wings inside my belly
no light in my eyes
This was long ago
before the wise shadows
of the fantoccini
commanded the land
when the moon
was the blind eye of a fish
in the back of a cave
—Frank Stanford
—found in What About This: The Collected Poems of Frank Stanford (2015)
—originally published in The Singing Knives (1971)