Black Beauty Poem by Ciaran Quirke

She of the ebony skin lies sick and prostrated
at the foot of the stairs.
She convulses, coughs, chokes on an excess of phlegm.

Her right hand soothes her aching paunch,
it's rounded mound
supporting her left arm, now broken at her breast.

He looks down from atop the stairs,
his distaste evident,
turns and silently walks away to business.

The charcoal man in the shadows runs out
to embrace, to console -
to console for what has been lost.