It starts. Slow. A whimper
That echoes through the oxygen mask
But barely audible to me.
He grabs at anything - everything
Trying to hold onto something from this world.
His grip is icy and frozen. His knuckles,
Bone showing through his paper thin skin
No meat under the wrinkled leather.

He relents. He knows.
It's time to go.
His eyes watery - two black pools
Widening at first in despair,
Then dilating with forgiveness. With resignation.
With acceptance?
He draws deep long breaths.
He stops feeling everything. No pain or fear
Except the heavy burden on his chest
Of regret - of who he’s left behind.

He was a son, a husband, a father.
To a mother. A wife. A child.
And now he is walking
Through the gates one last time. I know.
As I hold his hand
Because at the end
He doesn't want to be alone.

We sit separated by the parking brake
The car on hold, exhaust choked up
Like the words that won’t come out
How do I bring myself to say that

The park is silent and the air musty
And so are we; a million tissues lie around
Like a flower bed of scrunched up lilies
It’s getting warm and I get out
But the words don’t

I offer an olive branch
It’s not quite the same thing
All I do is cover the gun with a pillow
To muffle the sound when I pull the trigger
The bullet still hits. The bullet still
Hits

Maybe it was foolishness coupled
With regret. I bring myself to say
The greatest lie that I shouldn’t
But we are both tired and I really want to go

I bring myself to say I don’t
Love you.

if you stood here for hours
as you did in the louvre
maybe you could see the artful
space penetrated by pillars
walls barely containing the serenity
of a weekday afternoon

to your left, some modern piece
of what looks like a bright red payphone
one half-full-half-empty plastic cup
teetering over the top like it wasn’t sure
which way to fall.
only the black handle knows what numerous i-love-yous
the filipina maids at 3pm tell to secret lovers
or their families back home.

underneath, a yellow **** stain
like some duchamp
although the inebriated ahpek who made it probably
didn’t know how to pronounce his name.
du-champ? du-camp?
aiyah who cares. Art is still art.

trailing across the marble swirls
in the pockmarked concrete floor you find a footprint
and perhaps those who cast it years ago
are the faceless men at work.
hard hats atop their plastic bottles
laying back to the ground, eyes glued shut to the insides
of their eyelids as if in prayer for forgiveness
from the sweltering sun.

further left a metal centipede forged by abandonment and thievery
of bicycles left to rust - seats wrenched away from
their rusting frames
like a prisoner shackled to a wall, nails slowly pulled
from his fingertips.
and the centipede is a ******* because the wheels don’t go
round no more if they are even still there.
but is it still stealing if you take away
something unwanted?

and in the next few hours or so, if you should linger
stay slouched in a corner
Or seated on mosaic tiled stools
at a checkerboard table like a king.
watch as performance art
children
fresh out of class
but uniforms stinking of stale p.e. sweat
defy the big man through football
or ice-and-water
or making a hell lot of noise
even though the stick figure painting says
NO BALL GAMES
life imitates art
life defies art
life destroys art

there are so many things to see for free
in this common space
maybe we don’t value it
till some bold-faced girl paints
the staircase gold
then we cry out - THIS IS VANDALISM
THIS IS NOT ART
maybe if we stopped for hours rooted -
rooting - we would see the artistry
of the common space
but all we want to do
is to rush past each other and slam our doors shut.

Here is where we watched the lunar rise and you told me
Here is the moon. And there is Mars. And beyond?
Here is where we watched the stars and I pointed out
Here is Orion’s belt. And there is Ursa Major. And there is a satellite.
Here is where we scanned the pitch-black presuming I would be your satellite.
Here is the orbit that the ancients used to predict the future. But I don’t know.
Here is where I looked at you like a supernova. Bright? Wondrous? Dying.
Here is where I awoke to realise my feet were soaked because the moon was so high up.
Here is where I turned to see your face, pale, eclipsed by your wig.
Here is where I look back to see one set of footprints and another set of tire-tracks.
Here is where I can always swing back in an orbit to find you again.

I said No.
But you didn't care as you shaved me
First with a blade of stone, then bronze.
Then covered my scars with scabs of concrete and gravel.
I felt sick all over - vomited floods and sneezed rain and spat lava in the face of my
captor.
Still you strip away even more.
Still you blow smoke into my face.
Still you shame me by pouring waste over my head,
And let it run in every crevice and sphincter you can find.
I am chained down by wires. I’m shocked. Hands shake. Legs tremble.
Violated and defiled.  
I have given you all I can, ingrate.
Your friend Freud says you frisk me because you like me.
He smiles slyly because he says Mankind is Oedipus
And that's why I am called
Mother Earth.