Not Infinite

Not Infinite


by Gideon Burton

It isn't infinite. I've touched the edge,
the outer boundary, its fraying threads;
I've plumbed the mud that eons couldn't dredge
and found the fissures' fissures where they spread.
Can one abyss enfold more darkened mists?
An ocean's wrapped a cosmos in its flow;
the galaxies enclose in bulbous cysts
beneath a skin so vast one cannot know
the limits circulating, network red
returning down the corridor, benign.
How cold to hold the dryly caking mud,
until a golden thread expands its line.
     We spin, we spin and turn our heads on cue,
     unable to confess the mess that's true.

Photograph: flickr - thelastminute

Shipwreck

Shipwreck
by Gideon Burton

Below the surface I can breath the salt
That's seasoned coral banquet tables, shores
Of blank oblivion, that's salved the halt
And wounded joints of sailors. Ragged floors,
Crustacheon orchestras, have sewn the wind
Of arctic memory in tightened seams
No code can break, however many sinned
To taste the water of those fathom dreams.
No shipwreck's timbers snag the hollow course
Of oily time, dividing flesh from bone
And sandy grain from crags of lava coarse
And proud. Not even this, the moon, alone,
       Aloof, with all her ripping tides and pull
       Can wash one minute's breeze, one breath, less full.

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