Howard Firkin
The way the ferns are marching from
      one side of someone’s garden
      over generations

The cracks appearing in our smoothest
      planes: plaster board, cement,
      the skin around the eyes

The indeterminate vowel sounds of
      static: dry leaves,
      distant conversations

The clouded air we breathe within
      the city’s mirrored wadis,
      acrid, dry, sharp

The rippling sound of cars
      accelerating to a pointless
      stasis, disappearing

The woman in the cafe mouthing
      cake and reading from a grammar,
      conjugating food

The weakly sun, product of a weary
      set of loins, a lost remark,
      a treachery, a trick

The children smoking breath and
      cigarettes and begging from
      the hip hop station steps

The chicken net we stretch across the sky:
      the tram lines and their rigging wires;
      the last jet’s vapour trails

The way the ferns are marching from
      one side of someone’s garden
      over generations