Read Poem: MARROW, by Calum Robertson

you have become the marrow of my bones it is your turn of the tale for this telling now

you give reason to the tales told you give life to the clay figurine they will find in your
tomb

between thin hands resonant with the marrow shared you will find yourself in dark
passage

northern bound there is nowhere to go though for always north has been below you now
go south

where the markings on every aspen tree become an attribute of the trapline you find
yourself hunting on

planting snares wherever you approach only pausing to keep tea with the sky drinking
spruce brew

it is important to avoid lighting fires on beaches your snares do not like it the mirroring of
marrow

the rememory of where the sky first began to fall unsounding tomorrow yesterday and
quake your canine teeth

shake! there is no reason for your sobbing to fill tidal pools where sea shanties heavy run
there is cream cooling

in the pantry fae scheme to steal your stories but you are unmaking the marrow stored in
your reluctant bones

mask what you may your canine teeth pull back mutton from the bone in normandy flesh
becomes cheaper still

in normandy you steal french women and american beer dribble that dawn spilt between
your fingers

hold a rifle steady burn the beach into your trapline your trailhead is preserved that dark
passage

keep felt and sudden shrug you are the swinging gait of this gamboling universe marrow
held

what joking might you add to the empty laugh of a bonfire in a sheep field daughters of a
god

you will never know scream to remember the watchtowers of painful youths what do you
play when quiet flames snarl?

isobel goudie avoids your bones when she excavates the passage tomb floating on the
waters

found between tomorrow and today you are adrift even in undeath there is nothing but the
memory of lovers

transformed into wolves oh! how you long to join the hunt your hound bleeds out making
mud of hot blood

and snowmelt spring demands some sacrifice be made and you watch the cougar pounce
as you wake

on this hill blood dribbles up as the ocean pours down above telling tales and making
stories of the dawn

you are young and impossibly old you are the stones which made your tomb you are the
salt

you sold your sword for you are decayed sheep flesh rotting on the hill you are the canine
teeth

that greet each traveler at their respective long dark nights you are river run and all
muddled up with intrigue

collapse! you are doing too much the marrow boils in your bones on the beach you sleep

on the beach you burn while a hunting hound bleeds out your hands hold that clay figure
close

shell shards form chipped teeth of an ungainly smile stumbling south north is below you
now so cough life back

into your saggy lungs envious of the residuals something must happen before this story
becomes unmade

isobel goudie haunts your marrow boiled in your bones and holds out her tongue to sip
your sweat

fever! collapse in the woods drink nothing but melted snow there is a fox tail on your
shoulder she will spare the fur

unliving undeath are you really so forth due to return? quake and loosen teeth to chew a
grumbling sky

spit out beach bones shake shimmers from unraveling skin dog flesh fluttering in the
wind strung along barbed wire

you would think this place normandy hold the last breath stories of dying good old boys
drunk

on frenchen women and brave by american beer stolen tomorrow by yesterday you feel
how sand stings open wounds

let the marrow boul and damn tomorrow! isobel goudie greets you on the battlefield
ready to pray

or piss forgiveness down your wolfen throat the lovers have returned to watch the
longships burn

you may hide however you like you may rot while fiercely stood awake tombs on parade
begin to quake

and shake your remembering tongue there is violence in a quiet home when glasgow
chose to let yesterday sleep

let the sand sting you home become trapline collapsed at the trailhead your lovers await
transformed into wolves

at the trailhead yesterday awaits with a mug of spruce tea and snowmelt extended in
welcome

you do not choose to join this story made as the beach unravels scurry scurry towards the
waves

challenge the tomorrow yesterday brings in your tomb you inscribe a language all your
own written

by canine teeth collapsing eager to gnaw the bones of isobel goudie she knows the lovers
by twisted names

she dare not speak aloud you bellow the secrets of god on the trapline dripping beach
blood into the quiet snow

there is nowhere to go south when north retreats screaming into ocean sky scream along
you!
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scream along with tides who do not care to know your name when you scream back these
confessions remember

lovers at the trailhead reminding the north to bloom too you blossom crimson dread
wreckage you are a longship burning

on the beach you will accept all that the boiling marrow of your bones begins to ask of
you

there is silence in the passage tomb accepting the hollow noise unsounding of a longship
burning burning

where do you go when tomorrow fails to approach? all the snares are set the canine teeth
loose

longships moored above the trapline drizzle little bones of a broken foot down upon a
sleeper steeping tea

there is no tomorrow only every yesterday lurking in the marrow of your bones adrift
your tomb begins to float home

to a trailhead where is waiting the aspen branches warmed by midnight fires so you keep
off the beaches