Venice masks

Saturday, 12 September 2026

The Illuminated Manuscript - Kenneth Steven

They brought me from Ireland, still a boy
to begin their book.

I remember the day I left —
soft bread, a silvering of geese, the sound of my mother.

Now I slip the stone of these steps every day
long before dawn, breathe the dark

and hear the whelming of the winds about this fastness
before my one candle like a petal of gorse

flutters the shadows in ghosts over cold walls.
Out of the thin window I watch the sea all winter

heave and drag like a dying man,
the skies blackened and bruised.

Some days there is nothing in the pen except
my own emptiness; I hold it hoping

until the stars blow out from the attic of the skies
and a ledge of moon lifts across the hills.

Just sometimes something breaks inside
like the brittle lid of a casket

and pours out light onto the waiting page.

Kenneth Steven (born 1968) Scotland
Source: tweetspeak

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