absolutes always die
we get afraid
that they're everywhere
but life comes along each way
with compromise
by the way of wings
something like wasp wings
filling our fields and shoes
making us walk away
from bliss
like we would death
or the smell of it

what places the leather back
and makes everything smell
like best quality skin
is the knowledge
that
half love gets tired
much earlier than all this

it
can’t learn the steps
it’s happier to stumble away
than towards
the noose dances instead
and tightens
a lil harder
a lil fuller

knowing where to break its neck
before compromise mumbles
in silence
long before
we sing.

The tattoo appears soft
but buzzing and happy to appear
slapping old choice
away
and penetrating
choosing
your compulsion and colour
in spikes of energy and time
across our arms
like an inked map
of lines and endless capillaries
where the movement
in your elbow
upon me old kitchen table
in me old house over breakfast that time
is the sight i welcome in
steering the rest of tonight out
like a perfect camera beside me desk
a dancing needle in dancing shades
as the map glides
out of my control
but in welcome jest
on the page.

When people are allowed to pretend
they are never
truly
free

The sound
of a bus
is the chorus
of a man
or the woman
driving it
and the terrible rhythm
dragging us
to
and fro

it has has a name
it has a pyramid
effect
on us all

blue
remaining
architecture

noisy
over-whelming
flame.

Systems mix awake
like pills awaiting a passenger
searching for dogma
like a marching drill in the dessert
disturbing dunes
like a bullet distracting the crowd
shattering the skull behind you
muttering
and chattering again
in the world below its knees
where it connects again
sewn and hammered
accept oil
this time
golden
drapped in molasses
tuned at the heart
and joint
to continue
to have spirit and commune
with its line
and nothing

but its line.

The clams boiled back
and shut their eyes
when the water came
and finally swam away
giving one moment
many.

Letter headed grains of cement flow up
like reversed particles of snow sick of flowing down
changing back through the air
dancing through change like a gift and drift
raising us all, salt watered skin and all, seeping skin
and other numbers of bone like it
count the days no more
dancing back the in the waves of binary and soil
back to the starting arena once more
unaware of the birds that join
old neighbours within this world
acidic tongues biting the cheeks of day
lap at them now
forgetting the steps
and remembering how they join
in rhythm with the words of hell and grace, inking them
marking them
with gestures of spectrum and instinct
of flight over the greys of practice and time
which soar all the same
more sleet flows down now
intricate waves of flight collide against skin
as you separate and centre
held by the substance of your eye
grounded by root
like the sense you have to run
to the flood in the sky
where we are comfortable and coded
walking in metronome
painted by the herds of many
but formed by one
and fed by much.

The ideas we love unattended end up flowing down the drain
like excess soap
nothing gets washed and the unwashed shadow
on a shed wall lets a family of climbing vines make its home
on it and
inside it
nothing is tendered or cut in June
some hands come in May that are skilled enough
to paint around the edges without poisoning the plant
ball games give life to the court yard where the dog sleeps
and it stays alive
as long as the vines
are cut in this way.