the taxidermist can’t leave limbo
he sleeps awake with his own exhibits
it’s freezing outside he opens the curtains
is that the elephant standing in snow? he thinks
her twin-domed forehead her arched back
she should never have been stolen from the forest
or made to carry a howdah
she should never have been executed
he looks again is she kneeling?
is she blindfolded? he could never
take India out of her
the swirl of sari the sacred Ganges
still floated in her eyes the ones
he replaced with prosthetics
he should never have suspended her
between life and death
chemically altered in preparation
for the afterlife as an exhibit
but the taxidermist has children
and now must open the door
to a man cradling a dead
Chinese water deer
snowflakes on its tiny cervine teeth
Kerrin P. Sharpe has released three collections of poetry, each from Victoria University Press. Her fourth collection, louder, will be published by VUP in 2018.
