everything is gated
knots whirring like strings
knots lacing off wings
everything is weighted
fear is tainting everything
after linking the dots
that all tie up in knots
efforts slitting to nothing
the end has long been fated
word no comfort brings
doubt twisting looped rings
love never to be sated
The day I became a woman
the heat sizzled up from the ground
blurred over the tarmac
of the dark blue driveway
the cloudless sky clearcut
neatly at the horizon
Dad said they’d barbecue
steaks and sausages
with the neighbours
in the evening
, when the air’d cool off
the crickets made such a racket
trying to find one, lying on my belly,
the ground’s warmth under it
watched their legs crisscrossing
making anodyne songs
to anybody who would listen
but the lawn needs mowing
, dad said to no one
put on something decent
ladies don’t stay all day
in their undies
, lady, he said to me
so my brother took the grass clipper
out of the shed so old it shed
brown, curly, paint-shavings
he was panting, sweat-pushing
the heavy blades spin-shearing
the shiny green mantle
perspiration drawing cityscapes
on the back of his undies
I didn’t like that boys could
wear what girls couldn’t
he could stay in his underwear
I stood up, arms akimbo,
about to protest
Then I must have done something
it must have been the blades
of grass sticking to my chest
for dad looked up at me
transfixed, then
ran in slow motion
towards me
did I need to be saved
? were the grassblades cutting
into my flesh
? his gaze zeroed in on my belly
So I looked down at my panties
there was a ruby mountain, inverted,
right where my legs converged
like the reflection in a lake
right when sunset hits the top
I dipped my hand in its waters
a vague feeling of old pain
like a cold, hazy memory
In a blinding flash
I imagined the evening talk
around the chromed barbecue
the little one is a woman now
, they’d say
they grow so fast
lose their innocence so fast
, someone’d add
when I took my fingers out
glistening crimson
the urge came
to lick them
I knew that taste of metal
but wanted to know mine
but dad held my hand
my brother’s petrified eyes
at my gorgon-crotch chimaera
while dad washed my hand
in the sink outside
called out to mom
somewhere in the house
, the little one needs attention
, he said rather tersely
swiping his own fingernail
under mine to clear the clots
Am I in trouble dad
, I asked
no of course no you’re not
, he said ruffling my hair
, but now you can’t go about
strutting in your undies
, but why I asked
, because today you’re older
than you’ll ever be
, decide and guard
or decide and give
, he said
, he looked sad
his eyes slanted
handing me to mom
, yes I’ll do that dad
his big green eyes
shot into mine
, keep that fire up
, he said, and smiled
his back looked sadder
than I had ever seen it
The day I became a woman
the summer warmth
sizzled up from my stomach,
the crickets, the grass clipper,
my brother’s sweaty undies,
the smell of my own blood
as dad washed it up
all this fired up my soul
and burns bright still
so I decide
who to share
this fire with
and guard
and give
The drivers will trust the plastic-and-metal hull
to protect them from other masses of metal
hurtling down the road at 60 miles an hour.
The alpinists trust the asperities will hold their weight,
trust the ropemakers who threaded their fate,
the villagers trust the snow up the mountain will stay.
The lovers trust their hearts will withstand the blows,
those which sear the body and send down the throes,
dying of a soul ache is no longer in fashion.
Parents trust no funeral card will reach them at all,
and trust never to receive that midnight phone call.
Workers trust never to become superfluous,
trust colleagues to do their work and not shit on us.
The dancers trust everyone hears the music inside.
The musicians trust everyone sees the dance they hide.
Friends trust their friends to pick up the fucking phone,
no one this depressed should be left on their own,
they trust that ready-to-snap bootlace to hold
because they need to catch this last train
to help their friend as their forces wane
thus straining the very fabric of the world.
We trust hundreds of small things, every day,
we even pray for storms to pass overhead,
to hold and to let go, to leave and to stay,
we need to trust when all hope has fled
and black, menacing clouds come our way.
They fake it till
they forget they’re faking
over time become evil
and forget they had a soul
hack away at it until
none’s left and
evil turns natural
They forget they can’t have
more without the pain
always wave reality off
for a mockery of love
hate always a trade-off
hate always a gain
The rage they feel blinds them
makes them think hurting is caring
and human swiddens collateral
They smile through the chaos
and when gifted the heart
they request the soul
carve it out themselves
and swallow it whole
They drive with no brakes
hurtle through like meteors
down highways and streets
cutting corners until one of us dies
until one of us cheats
They drain time like a black hole
smother all light until
nothing’s left
but empty shells
cracking underfoot
in the darkness
They do not stop
and never give in
until the fire without
echoes the fire within
"Je rêve d'un jour où l'égoïsme ne régnera plus dans les sciences, où on s'associera pour étudier, au lieu d'envoyer aux académiciens des plis cachetés, on s'empressera de publier ses moindres observations pour peu qu'elles soient nouvelles, et on ajoutera "je ne sais pas le reste"."
Évariste Galois (1811-1832)
If I can’t love in full, I can’t love at all.
As then my love dies like echoing footfalls.
But you, you let it die. Conscientiously.
I can’t do half-loves found on rebated shelves.
Nor can I do small sex like some do small talk.
But you, stifled it, with a pillow, slowly.
Feigning ignorance isn’t my strongest suit.
But you, you asked me. I tried. I did. I failed.
So you took my love, crumpled it, and burnt it.
I stared at you while the flames consumed it all.
Not with rage, nor with hate, nor with disbelief.
I didn’t stare with love, or disappointment.
I watched you as I have watched so many leave:
bruised, battered, confused, happy and unhappy
to leave yet another soul scorched up, writhing.
Your tone and words more chilling than the blizzard
always, as if gloating, as if satisfied.
Ashen prize in a smouldering, ashen land.
You brought many, down in your personal hell,
so that love looked worthy and achievable.
Thus I looked, found my ashes, took them, and left.
Not that you faked your feelings and sentiments:
there simply was no room for love among them,
and my own was too cumbersome to carry.
There is no vow to never do it again:
there will be other people falling with you;
there will be other times when I give my love.
But one thing more certain than the next sunrise
is that your soul dims as your fire brightens
is that my love whole always shall be given.
Cooking he was. Like always.
Chatting with the wife. Like always.
Watching dumb shows eating crisps
by the fake crackling fireside,
the dog curled up at her feet.
Her presence, unenviable,
Slightly passive-aggressive, always.
The grim stare. The unanswered
“What’re we having for dinner”.
The evening going to bed alone,
waking up she there already,
pulling the long face already.
He didn’t hate her, nor did she.
They grew to unlove, listlessly.
Two kids, that is all it took
to kill the little joy in their life.
“I don’t hate you, just so you know,”
he said. It fell in dead ears,
both hers and the dog’s, unmoved.
He hated when they did that,
giving him the cold shoulder
“I’m heading to bed then.”
He got up, thinking of their sons:
none of them ever came home,
or called for birthdays and sad days,
or sent postcards, wedding cards,
or just… existed after they left.
“I’m heading to bed then”
he repeated – to himself this time.
He got tired, suddenly.
Sat back down, a knot in his throat.
Come morning, he would call them.
When the police came a week later
they found the old man slumped on the couch
next to a mouldy, empty armchair,
an old dog mat with half-chewed toys
dinner set for two in the kitchen.
The neighbour said the old widower
didn’t have all the lights on
that the dog had died years earlier
was buried in the backyard.
Nobody ever came home.
The day the storm hit the coast
he drifted along the shoreline
looking for trouble in her jade eyes
– see-through waves through
the discoloured sun –
chaos and fury in his heart
hoping to find her of the pale eyes
forever resting in the waves
Folk who say it will be the same
when the two of us are done here,
when we part ways for good,
don’t know that we’ve built something,
something worthy of the name ‘love’.
When this love will have run its course
it’ll have nowhere to go, no aim,
and it’ll take way too much room
– it’s grown quite big, didn’t it darling.
So we’ll have little choice but to drown it,
pull it head first down the bathtub
and keep it underwater for a while
– until its lungs fill up and swell
and we need to dry it up
before we can burn the carcass
– until its legs form odd angles
underneath its slouched body
Darling, maybe we’ll need to tie its hands
so it doesn’t scratch and grip,
– and its feet too, no nasty kicks,
just its belly doing its dance,
and its hair like Medusa’s
– it would be a good idea, we think.
No, we won’t look at its bulging, bloodshot eyes,
or at its snakey, purpley, swollen veins
– for we want to sleep at night, don’t we darling.
Maybe it’s easier to do these things, darling,
because we were selfish and trampled it
with both feet on its chest, caved the ribs in,
and still called it ‘love’, lovingly,
because we stopped caring as much.
Maybe it won’t fight back when we strangle it,
accepting its fate with open wrists and throat
– we slowly choked it with our lies, didn’t we
– faking interest and orgasms and conversations
didn’t we darling, patient in our rage,
meticulous in our vivisection,
methodical lovers-turned-skinners surgeons.
Folk who say it will be the same
when the two of us are done here,
when we part ways for good,
don’t know that we created and killed
something worthy of the name ‘love’.
Something on the mind
chipping away at the heart
clipping crevices smooth
seeking diaphany
nagging the tip of the tongue
not quite unright or unthere
Something on the mind
thinning the eyelids
spurring pins and needles
tightening frumpled fingertips
Something on the mind
that behoves death to endure
weighing a goliathan star
pullgraviting everything about
alldreading void and longing
Something on the mind
spirating slowly into stasis
sunstilled dust particle
snapshot into existence
In one last, contorted pulse
something on the mind
flashflaring like a supernova
tesselating the seen and felt
fractalled into sense
Something on the mind
opened eye and hand
and fell out of both
in the sharp, exacting light.
The day was torn and grim birds yet began to sing as if they knew nothing’s eternal and old gives way to new that man, one day, will fall t...
