Anniversary
How cold the gown is, after years
of camphor, moonshine
tangled in the sleeves, the bodice
brittle, like the ghost
of puppetry.
No one will wear it
now, it can't be sold;
and no-one but
the mailman still believes
in happy ever after,
walking from door to door
at Christmas, with no guarantee
of snow, the last post
slender in his hands, the windows
post-box-red
and green against
the night, a local
Saxony of glint
and afterthought,
its byelaws
groundless and Medieval,
like the heart.
John Burnside's collections include The Hoop (1988); The Light Trap (2002); The Good Neighbour (2005); Gift Songs (2007); and Black Cat Bone (2011), which won both the Forward Prize for Poetry and the T.S. Eliot Prize. In 2008, Burnside received the Cholmondeley Award. His prose works include the collection of short stories Burning Elvis (2000), as well as several novels and memoirs. The Devil’s Footprints (2007) was shortlisted for the James Tait Black Memorial Prize and A Summer of Drowning (2011) was shortlisted for the Costa Book Award. A former writer-in-residence at Dundee University, he currently teaches at the University of St. Andrews.
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