Nick Andrews
Fever
There is the cold, clean clop
of hooves on cobbles outside
and the doctor is gone,
leaving me a clove of garlic.
But where is his sleek, black Saab?
And why has he left me such strange medicine?
The pale, papery skin peels easily away
from the raw, white clove:
a caustic capsule of fume and fire
bursts like a blister
on the back of my throat –
someone is playing a song in my head,
but I cannot recall the words.
And now my father is sucking a mint;
pruning the roses and rolling the lawn.
He smiles and beckons and fades back
into the dream he’s cut in the turf.
The song is suddenly silent
and the doctor is back with a carriage:
the hooves of his horse muffled with tiny felt shoes,
so when we leave they will not wake me up.
Page(s) 13
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