What wife.
What son.
I am antiphon, chanting myself real each winter.
I am Charles, Beloved! Charles besought.
They swarm, my courtiers. Wool-wrapped Charles says no shattering. No touch.
(I thought perhaps I am light-struck, Owl King, Lancastrian eventide, war-no-more.)
Father’s tapestries line my chambers—Theseus survives, in them, six times. From my pillow I see each hanging hell-mouth, each labour. He slays each enemy by his own method.