Landscape
Bryan Ferry
2025
Two police people fold bridles
into an open box
There is a fun fair going on
I ask
Can a bridle be folded?
Hung, yes
but you'd want to keep the threads
the pieces
apart
There usually would be a stable girl for that
The police may not have experience
with bridles tangling up
The police people are wearing black jodhpurs
On their tops are bullet proof vests
And what I can only assume
are bullet proof riding hats
They are top heavy
The legs like spiders'
Look, I laugh
What, I say
if a horse were to gallop off

I twirl a stick at the funfair
and the funfair tempts me in
A white poker
Candyfloss
A ride is worth nothing more than a ride
says my brain
The wind whipping
The knotting
Note the horses tied around the edge
The bashfulness of the kids
The cleanliness of the mane, the plaits
The gloves used to hold the reigns
The smallest comb would be needed
and eventually scissors
Ribbons
A chisel for her feet

I feel synthetically free
as the ride rotates
The funfair is without conflict, I thought
Rotations, I thought
was a word used at work
meaning to shift and resolve
Actually meaning to sever order
New rotations
A cover for all sins
I'm rotating out of a difficult spell
A sticky patch
with areas of bog that flash with loose change
Tent pegs braced in the face of wind
and on all sides
a cordon made of beasts