I am an old dog.
Fur thick from winter nights
Under stars, paws hard from
Scratching at the
Insides of doors.

Sad old eyes see through
Actions and words, reading
Intentions and tendencies.
Biting only to teach
Or carry.

I see the kicks behind your steps.
The nervous punches behind your
Patting.
Invade my space, and I'll make you
A cat person.

I don't have time for your
Self-pity and negative meditations.
Reincarnation has finally granted
Me this simple existence of
Non-illusion.

Picture a leash, and I'll
Never walk at your side.
Free from your two legged
Two-facedness; anything human is
Puppy to me.

Don't try to force me. Or own me.
You'll only fail. You'll always
Fail at taking the animal
Out of the
Animal.

I didn't come this far
To be tame.
I didn't work so hard at not
Needing, to end up begging for
A full bowl.

I came from Sicily,
The bone-dry land
Of abandoned temples
Where my ambitions
Did not blossom,
And London was my brightest future.
A future made
Of bills to pay
Of a too expensive rent
Of one meal a day,
Of jobs that slipped
Too easily through my fingers.
But the future was mine at last,
It was mine to read, to grasp,
Frantic, enigmatic, full of riddles
Like the copy of Ariel I had bought
One day at the bookshop.
And just like that copy
Of Sylvia’s book
The future is so cruel,
Yet so incredibly beautiful.

Fattish crumbs of furry bread, they keep
Their bodies elastic even when
The frost blocks the eyelids.
Sleeping close to samovars, a symbol
For the warmth which stays hidden
In domestic walls, for the affection
Disclosed under layers of ice.
When babushkas wait to die
Russian cats lay their paws
On decrepit hands
And if the big journey starts
They are the first to bid farewell,
Then go back to the snowy streets of Russia,
Carefully avoiding drunkards
And marshrutkas.

If I slit your throat on the peak of our relationship’s winter
The cut would unleash flocks of swans and swallows
My hands around your neck instead, stained by drops of void
Would manage to make scars out of nothingness.

Desperate, I might keep cutting through – inventive surgeon,
Seeking the source from where your rivers flood.
If your skin turned into mirror you would reflect
All the barren fields I hold inside

And if I tried to breath out a summer you would still be
A country cold and without heating, whose winters
Unfold slowly as petals and whose paths interweave
With lost rays of sunshine gone chilly.

You bared the trees yourself, one by one,
Suckling out each drop of chlorophyll from branches sharp and sick.
Poisoned the root and soil. Left the ground unspoken. Undertook
A silent treatment.

Beaks and shrieks, wanting to come out, peck hard
The back of your eyes. Beneath your capillary carpets
Lies the fear to let go, your sleep unwise
Creates new monsters with each and every snore.

I can distinctly see my voice disfiguring your face
With an axe of sound – and yet the lake of your eye, firm and clear,
Doesn’t fade out in circles. Deaf to the echoes, split into halves
Your skull doesn’t speak up.

If I cut your throat once more, the void dropping out, kissing my hands
Would never leave me. If I, armed as a knight, uncovered
Your wake and finally found you
You might never be lonely again.

Harmony in a couple is not breakfast in bed
Or flowers as the first thing handled in the morning,
But farting at the same tempo
Just before awakening.
No sheep to count when bedtime comes,
But my teeth biting your *******
Til I bleed you to sleep,
Half of my lips left to mark
This flesh forever.
If you ****** me as much as I wanted
The next dlr stop before Bank in my head
Would be renamed SHAGWELL.