In for a Penny

In for a pound, the centaur died.

His rusted cage began to curl
Away from its anchors. Ants fried
On the concrete floor. That's a pearl

That was his eye, whose setting failed.
The better men and calmer bards
Have winkled out, have not been jailed,
Kings of their graven calling cards.

The mistress primps her painted bones.
The Greek is wrong and the Chinese
Opaque as Pocatello. Loans
Sustain the fingers as they freeze.

Off the wet page the hand-set words
Scarper. The night men clank and shift,
Marley in chains. From ill-kept birds
Onto the Thames the adverbs sift.