The Tender Index

By the gate I broke the slate  

Laid across the mouths of eight;  

Something stirred beneath the bier:  

Come, my dear.

Eight, it seemed, had tongues of wire  

Where the mire had quenched a fire  

Long before the reckoned year:  

Come, my dear.

Clad in clay, a ghoul at play  

Stripped a corpse and made it sway,  

Turning on a rusted gear:  

Come, my dear.

Bone on bone, it spun alone  

While the church’s flags of stone  

Beat a code against my ear:  

Come, my dear.

Not a dance, I thought, but chance  

Bent the knees in that advance  

Toward the thing which drew them near:  

Come, my dear.

In the chest, a wheel compressed  

All the breath the dead possessed  

Into rings of one small sphere:  

Come, my dear.

Pressed in lead, the buried dead  

Kept the vowels their nurses said  

Though no child was left to hear:  

Come, my dear.

Word by word, the wheels conferred  

With a clerk whose voice I heard  

Call the ghoul an engineer:  

Come, my dear.

On a rack, a thing of black  

Glass unhinged and answered back  

In a voice the rolls revere:  

Come, my dear.

One said Mallow, soft and slow,  

While the glow began to grow  

Dim where Mara’s name was clear:  

Come, my dear.

Spinning round, a skull was bound  

Face to face with mine; I found  

Not a letter, front to rear:  

Come, my dear.

Twice I let the pair keep time;  

Twice, in time, I saw the lime  

Seal a maker’s mouth and ear:  

Come, my dear.

Set in glass, the breath could pass,  

Fill a million throats of brass,  

Pure, if no one else came near:  

Come, my dear.

Each was made, and each obeyed  

Rules that kept the dead unfrayed,  

Each to each a thing to fear:  

Come, my dear.

Floor by floor, the valves let more  

Dead uncoil across the floor;  

Every age was gathered here:  

Come, my dear.

“Mara,” said the list of dead;  

Mallow’s lover shook its head,  

Hearing something like a sneer:  

Come, my dear.

Word for word, I spoke what stirred  

In the name I first had heard,  

Lest its owner disappear:  

Come, my dear.

Palm to palm, it begged for balm  

While the record droned its psalm  

Sharp enough to split a gear:  

Come, my dear.

Not a bruise, no broken fuse  

Made the hands the lovers use  

Shake with what I called its fear:  

Come, my dear.

Set the catch and seal the hatch  

On the pair whose fingers snatch—  

Keep each separate channel clear:  

Come, my dear.

Cell by cell, I heard them tell  

All the names they knew too well  

With no tongue that could come near:  

Come, my dear.

Who could weigh what fell away  

When the brass began to say  

What no ear was made to hear?  

Come, my dear.

Not for bread, the ghoul had fed  

On the speech the makers shed  

Just to draw another near:  

Come, my dear.

Take a rock and break the lock;  

Let the buried lovers rock  

Where the dead had stood austere:  

Come, my dear.

Face by face, the ranks gave place  

Till the last unaltered trace  

Thinned to what I could not hear:  

Come, my dear.

All its own, yet still in bone,  

Came a word no roll had known,  

Soft enough to make me fear:  

Come, my dear.

Now the slate beside the gate  

Marks my voice as out of date;  

Mallow bends to draw me near:  

Come, my dear.

Through the clay I cut away  

Mallow cuts a path today,  

Sets my teeth upon the bier:  

Come, my dear.