carefully her shadow
looked about for the devil
who found itself
laying quite comfortably amongst
some old tarnished cutlery.

here, shadows can recall
what tall crystal forgets
She placed her knife down
alongside the other silver,
perfectly still

The kingdom is troubled,
she smoothed back her curling hair
‘my secret is that
you really should not have come back here’

alarmed,
I wandered ‘round the room
looking for two white stones and hope
but instead I found
that I am lame with memory.
she shook with jellied laughter
I implored weakly, just above a whisper,
‘Nevertheless, you must tell me
what Juliet said.’