Daffodils

by Fran Lock

and what of them? hardy stragglers
between wastelands, waste lanes
with the weather wetly trepanning
the factories. by junctions of squat
hope, the stooping of resolute
chimneys, i saw them: thin enough
to pass through the slit in a cat's
eye yellowly. a salute, an assault,
the meadow's broken heil! how
nature tightens her failed telepathy,
frail masturbator's grip on our
fancy. fancy. poets, those grim
custodians of oath, tending
the cut and sober fiefdoms
of the field. we are picking
away between panels: tablets
bearing the ten commandments
of solarity. we have filled our
mouths with the burst blue flame
of aftermath. we have come to
collapse here, lie down our
numbered days amid the tepid,
bending farce of them. here,
with what the birds beat out
between a tatty governance
of wings, with the end times
motto the snake rolls up in
the black phylactère of his
tongue. here they are, swollen
with staying power. immortal
hosts. we are dying. we are all
dying, but they did not get
the memo.