markbousfield

BOLIVIA

Enduring the hardship of late ice
together we hike up the mountain to Olympus

to make the heart beat strong,
robust in the face of pain and beauty
courteously our muscles want,
ache, give and come
under the strain of the livery of the dead.

In warm blood we defy the banner
sealed by vanquished oil and heroes laid to sand.

Committed in infamy, by chance and the capricious fruits of expedition,
the telling of a fortune through the burial eye of a stranger,
cavorting on the rocks of Gibraltar
with emancipation and lustful desire
now we know you, the wanton ridiculor of death,

but sadly only the death of a man not the sounds of the idea
muted by the mouths of Scylla
revitalised by the face seen before sleep each night,

testing the mettle of flesh against the poppy seed.