byline on the author photo
provides a place to start:
he pretty, monochrome
she a mystery merely a name
maybe Malay
slight hint of a distant
land of water, stilted homes
then there is a handwritten
inscription on the flyleaf
but that tells us nothing
the depths to which I
depths or heights
it was ever
these are extraordinary times we
— always they are, times, extraordinary
extratemporal
the sun setting quicker
tideline shifting
contours mobile on the map
call of curlew nocturnal
mildew & must
a suspicion
moisture of empire
has entered the pages