He Once Knew An Angel. Poem by Mary X

When you hurdle
into your pit-painting
gargling with salt-water,

you’ll walk and lurch
over something
quite remarkable, friend

with no tonsils.
There you were
and there you are, friend

with no tonsils –
inside that fruit
painting, two

feet for apples
and nature
spirals out of control

with it’s reproduction
and cigarettes.
Then in an instant;

what lies beneath the beams?
Those beautiful miracles
complete and endless

on the floor. Two
wings, two angel wings
singing and smiling

as you wish them to.
They aren’t broken, yet
feather of the wing.

The best word that
the wings ever described
it’s onlooker as:

‘Ethereal.
Ethereal.
Ethereal.’

Two angel wings
laying on the floor,
they crack like an egg

into a pan, why
shouldn’t one be so pure?
shouldn’t two angel wings

be strong?
Magnetic currents
file out from the

wings and brawl
onto the concrete.
The onlooker looks

towards the sky.
The wingless angel sighs
sitting on his stone cloud.

Rain pours down all day.


Mary X.