Stephanie Bolster: TAPESTRY, THE CLOISTERS



Stephanie Bolster
TAPESTRY, THE CLOISTERS


The unicorn made of stitches by hands by the thousands
of hours in Ghent or Bruges or possibly years.
The unicorn held in a ring of pickets
his beard and buckled collar and blood where they caught him.
All around the flowers with the names of Venetian glass
the hellebore and unbidden berries. All around a place
they went to day and night the candles straining the eyes.
Skin softened by wool the sheep in the field the wolf.
At this great distance the horn is the pinnacle
as tall as the beast is rampant its tip a single thread
squinted over an instant still flinching.


from A Page from the Wonders of Life on Earth. London, ON: Brick Books, 2011. Used by permission.

Read my conversation with Stephanie Bolster here.