It's Still Life

British Military Campaign Desk From Burma

In threes. Top. 2 side units. Open straight through.
Officer’s desk. Heavy as God’s infinite wisdom.

Every desk has a lock. Not every lock has a key.
Locks. Picked. Opened. Old wood and camphor.

A list of names. In sequence. Letters in a drawer.
Written in a place too hot. Air disguised as oxygen.

We are plagued. But we still dress for dinner.
Dripped heat and quinine. And tea at 3′.

We march on barbed wire. Jungles baptised.
Blood and soft voice syllables. Walk.         On.

So little left for survival. We want truth: Did
God create chickens and eggs simultaneously.

We cheat at a game of marbles. Stand. Sweat.
Inhaling damp flaky paint from the walls.

This desk is an old brown. Flat. Coffee-stained.
And then my pen rolls, and falls on the floor.

Some things are so much a part of us
                that we forget they once weren’t.

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Once I’d seen Miz Quickly’s 8 Dec prompt, Make Something Out of Alchemical Elements (I went with earth), I knew how to approach dVerse Poets Passions Stamped On Things. This is a Fragment Poem. My husband uses my Burmese teak desk because it’s too large for my office. Its history places it in Burma from mid- 1800s and throughout WWII. It found its way to Hong Kong, where I bought it, and took it back home the UK. It’s made to be easily transported; the top is not fixed to the drawers – it’s just set on top of them, its weight creating a very sturdy platform. Shared with #APoemADay on Twitter   ©Misky 2021