On Encountering a Cockroach in Cyprus
My pride at getting on with spiders,
meeting mice without a bleat
comes to this fall. You
toddle towards me,
feelers waving,
my scalp ripples,
my flesh becomes a choppy sea
Years of reading what the Buddha said,
how the Tao goes, have left their mark;
I cannot kill you
so I corral you
in the dank bathroom,
laying a towel under the door,
a blue towel, but this is our green line.
meeting mice without a bleat
comes to this fall. You
toddle towards me,
feelers waving,
my scalp ripples,
my flesh becomes a choppy sea
Years of reading what the Buddha said,
how the Tao goes, have left their mark;
I cannot kill you
so I corral you
in the dank bathroom,
laying a towel under the door,
a blue towel, but this is our green line.
All night a sinister
pottering on the other side.
Are you plotting to cross?
Mobilising more of your kind?
Obscene laughter at four o'clock
cracks the thin glaze of my sleep
and a flittered fact revisits me:
in the event of apocalypse
it's you who'll inherit the earth.
I observe the green line meticulously,
resort to the kitchen sink when I need to pee,
crossing only when the sun shows up.
There you are, small and skulking,
the colour of a blanched raisin,
paler than the richly evil shade I'd pictured.
When I look again you're gone.
I check my shoes,
rifle through my suitcase,
scuttle down the narrow stairs.
My taxi for the airport waits.
I step into silky, early air,
trying to shake from my skin
prophecy's skittery patter.
© Katherine Duffy
pottering on the other side.
Are you plotting to cross?
Mobilising more of your kind?
Obscene laughter at four o'clock
cracks the thin glaze of my sleep
and a flittered fact revisits me:
in the event of apocalypse
it's you who'll inherit the earth.
I observe the green line meticulously,
resort to the kitchen sink when I need to pee,
crossing only when the sun shows up.
There you are, small and skulking,
the colour of a blanched raisin,
paler than the richly evil shade I'd pictured.
When I look again you're gone.
I check my shoes,
rifle through my suitcase,
scuttle down the narrow stairs.
My taxi for the airport waits.
I step into silky, early air,
trying to shake from my skin
prophecy's skittery patter.
© Katherine Duffy
Contact Katherine Duffy at: info.katherineduffy@gmail.com