Stuart Cooke

that fire shape, exploding into brush, tree shimmer

begging beach, beech sprayed

with moonglow

chopped out quick

-ly by the northern beat

in a bit

nursing out loud, that

peaked lyre

straightest

pine who, cunning curl

goes woop, copiously

copious laurel grafting tune, brush tune

to air, where

emergent adders rough apple

the black-

breasted buttons swallow wedges, rare yellow

bellies walk the sticks, talk the end

—it all ends any place, it all ends

nowhere—

to clashed out orbit, underground sun

dusk

eats distance, it all ends, sewn up

with flocks of leaves, so

this early loom

this starlight caught in mist

it dries tiny and rays

it croaks, it

sweats

can’t facts slip out

and feed

the heavy west

Stuart Cooke has won the Gwen Harwood, Dorothy Porter and New Shoots poetry prizes. His latest collection of poetry is Opera (2016). He lives on the Gold Coast, where he lectures at Griffith University.