Murder’s Professor

Fierce-proud crow-piper am I

On Prospero’s good-wind, miller days,

Born of winter raven-burn,

Murder’s elegant professor,

Confessor to fictions.

But soak-pinioned this morning;

Strangled by long-rain pains,

Deserted by my elsewhere-whoring muse,

Cowed, half blind and cowardly,

I am hangover-hobo hobbled in drab

Hedgerow’s glory-naked frame-of-crown:

Mobbed by doubt and bastard clouds.

Image: www.liverpoolmuseum.org.uk