And Irish Butter

pure fairy tale and unalloyed I dreamed through reading
not necessarily through life that too clouded lens
but in reading in waves of reading

finding the way back to the cottage from where we begin to scatter
the crumbs of light
so that wo might be less alone

I remember.
I remember, do you
whatever you you are

this time out of the mirrored box where
reflections only collapse into themselves
I don't know.

carry the music box forward and don't add the one
when you're up at the board and the whole class is watching
and the teacher says there's no musical notation like that

in the known world 
and you think how could there be
and wake up in your own room

safe from schools.
with Maeterlinck's bluebird singing into the sky the coral,
the lacelike clouds

and there is dark bread to eat and Irish butter
and we are unaccountably happy.

mary angela douglas 6 september 2020