Mandeville

I rather like the opening of this poem from Matthew Francis' Mandeville:

Of Bethlehem and Jerusalem

When you have used a knife or a cup and put it down,

after it comes to rest and your warmth has gone from it,

and though there is no mark of your hand on grip or bowl,

there is a moment when you still have each other's shape,

when your skin remembers it, and it remembers you,

like a part of yourself you left, and must go back for.

These are places that God used and has just put down.

A narrow city, well-walled and moated, that he used

for being born in. There is a church built on the spot.

Click here to download a PDF file from Matthew Francis about his creative reworking of The Travels of Sir John Mandeville.