Their whiteness bears no relation to laundry by June Wentland

Their whiteness bears no relation to laundry…* 

lard, onions, pastry,

cotton vests for a second baby.

 

Wind-picked rabbit skulls

and tic-infested ewes, have refused

 

to ingratiate themselves sufficiently

to be referenced. O for a knocked up

 

white with an improper hue

stolen from a blood-suckled

 

moon, tucked like a bump

up a jumper. White as a compound

 

too bulky for navvies to heave

from the slurp of the loam. Fractious

 

calcium, where skin chances on bone.

The pitch and resist of his cheek –  

 

sticky as a fallen damson.

 

*The title of this poem is taken from ‘Magi’ by Sylvia Plath