Fire knows the wood's secrets,
the flame-tipped branch a pointed
lie. Deep out there, rumbled,
your animus treads through
broken brick - from an excavated
castle or a moat which lost its breath
just before the shovel and the gasp.

No hiding holes out in the field -
too open, too wide for lies.

I'd misremembered what I lack,
but in your grip, it pounded back.