for Katherine Osborne*

falsehoods
I was sure
to say
to a horse, things like
god is sending
his middle
child
to collect
a drop
of my daughter’s
blood, or

it’s a sin
to be
1989, things I felt

I owed
the horse, that were
horse-like
in their stillness, that went
nowhere
when nowhere
was

come fly
or flat
earth

the dark’s
*****