The Path's End

Cyclamen, yes.  Have you seen leaves
marbled and wide as the striped sleeves
which were the frog’s legs in the lash

of spring’s first rain, white edge, the flash
of his scared eye?  Our squirrels would
scrape out each corm, so I must place –

like metal grilles before a face –
old dish drainers, black oven shelves,
so English plastic, Chinese chrome,

prevent the eye from striking home.
Yet they dissolve beneath my view,
you see the bars, as hard as grief,

I see the points which spin each leaf,
the frailest stems, a thumbnail’s space,
white upswept wings.  Cyclamen, yes.

Alison Brackenbury