DÉCOUVRIR LE CIEL

Doesn't even know
another language exists

but he likes the sound
steals this "CIEL"

from a passing conversation
hoards such words...such sounds.

Loves their texture
their taste upon the tongue.

He thinks it says
"See...L."

Why the hell
"L"?

Can't count for nuts
so doesn't even know

it's the alphabet's
12th letter.

But likes the fact that
he has 2 L's in his name.

And so he acquires
language in such

little broken bits
like this.

His dyslexia loves it
and that's enough for him.

He's fallen for
the letter L.

He's amazed when
in palm and psalm

it refuses to
speak up for itself.

Years later "CIEL" will
become the sky in French.

Well, well.."CIEL"
who would have thought it.

Even now his dyslexia
that magpie of the mind

will morph words
and shape shift sound.

His brain second guessing
what it's found.

So that passing in a car
the Clavadel Convalescence Home

you know the one
with the cow outside

in its pyjamas
and with a bandaged knee

becomes....the clavicle
in his warping mind.

And his head chants
"the clavicle...the clavicle

there's nothing like
the clavicle . . .

for extending the manubrium
of the sternum

and the acromion
of the scapula!"

And so Eliot's mystery cat
becomes a mash up with

filched medical
knowledge.

The dyslexia laughs
"That's my boy!"

Ah well
the English language

goes to L
in a handcart

and all's well
that ends well

even if
it isn't.

Me and that boy
I was and still am

continue
in tandem to

both invent and
discover the sky

...découvrir le ciel

...inventer le ciel!