A Zurich Swan

as he says　　happiness takes the form of a dirge
hanging on to a beauty it doesn’t know
the dancing waters　　have feigned sleep for seven hundred years
shooting a hurried glance at the person on the bridge’s arch
as she says　　if you can’t retrieve it then chew it bit by bit
another snowstorm plunging into the armpit
orange-red beaks stretch one by one toward a familiar-seeming shore
the ardour of the flesh　　craves discarding

a twitching quill pen　　had it signed more deathbeds
would still be singular　　as he said when he stood on the water
as she　　recognising in its reflections the only coldly overlapped swan
flapping broken wings on the riverbed　　says　　sunlight is cud-chewed
the beauty of fingers lies in tightly grasping disorientation
leaking the blue of the inner self　　a more blinding setting for a silver seam
bent into its own blood-fouled ornament
confirming the great bird’s frenzy　　dirge-like serenity