I've had a stomach ache
since I was seven, a blade
in my belly, a hive in my head
have you ever mistaken a bee
for a wasp? they sting and say
incessantly buzzing, pricking
they want out as much as I do
Some days I want to peel my flesh
cut myself in half and purge the venom
watch it seep out of me like
sticky sap from a sycamore
instead I take my medicine
and talk about you.

Somewhere between ripe and rotting, I will love me again

Wear my flesh like rind and reclaim my sweetness


I am not dying yet, but I am not living         and I am thirsty

For days, dazed and drugged on dirt’s divinity, brown knees


Nestled under the willow tree, the sun promises to purify me

Before the night swallows it whole, and regurgitates it tomorrow.


Somewhere between ripe and rotting, I will shatter my shame

Shed my sin, kiss palm to palm and nail a cross above my bed


Rid myself of impiety and feel what it feels to be clean.

I will walk the veins of the forests and trail the spines of the hills


Forage for berries and fall stupidly in love, over and over and over

With the art of existence and one day I will mean it when I say


I want to live. I want to live. I want to live. I want to live.

Perhaps      the    best of me      is behind              beyond
that          point of irreversibility           a beacon
of       inevitability           and it serves                as such

I am no longer       shiny     or     shocking     or     new
a        brown paper bag           crumpled     and      creased
milk that     sours    and      curdles        a   homesick     orphan

a     lamb   on    its   back   and    I  will   always   be    a  child
I will   always   be   a   child   I    will    always     be   a   child      

Love      contorts     me             I    curve    and    twist    
and       grow          larger           and            wider
I am              a flesh ball               a blush balloon
punctured by         a mere *****                I am sensitive

tuned        too tight        like my         Grandmother’s    piano
but it was     the first   I ever played     so no other     sounds right
and    I tell      my first       love      the       same        thing

I am entropy         the blaze of a sun          a deity of delusion
a fickle fig                                                 (pick, peel, devour)

I am a tear in your jeans    a loose thread     a love-sick sack
a daughter                                     (and some days, a mother)

I am tin teeth      a blade in your belly      a hive in your head
a feeble fawn                                                      (a black bull)

I am an amalgamation of       deficiency     and         divinity
coarse and common as coal        I am the     sun    the nether
the shade under the rock         I am nothing       nothing at all

When I say “I feel sick”
what I really want to tell you
is I am sick of fearing     sick
of fearing living but what
do I do if I fear dying too?
Where is my home
if not the ground or under it?

You say “we all feel like you”
but I am standing in a room
there is a subtle bang
and I am the only one fleeting
I am the only one but I am
one of many hosts this illness inhibits
so why do I feel so lonely?

Loneliness promises      safety
has been      distorted
thoughts now occupy me so
i am sorry i cancel plans &
cry in concerts &
make excuses &
leave early &
silence myself
but the thoughts are loud
and I am aching (everywhere)

I am at war with my mind

pearl feathers you refuse to call white
scared it would mean something if you did
scared your scepticism will cup cold palms
around your warming neck and squeeze
what little belief you have out of you
a corpse will always be a corpse
but the soul of a wanderer will wander
into the wind and sky and I
and you too if you just let him
so let him

let him be the breeze
that forces you to stop counting
the number of days that have passed
since he last hugged you

let him be your buoy that
serves ground in an ocean
that knows of no stillness

let him be
the flickering light
the white butterfly
the fallen feather

he will be forever with us
let him be

thirteen days left of summer
i am thirteen               thirsty
for genuinity                today
served me nothing         i am
hungry        to be     eighteen
in grass that is chrome green
feeling ***** but feeling clean      &
not apologising for it

tired of hearing talk of
butterflies       are tired
of their wings being the
object of one’s affection
and we are one          to
talk          about the skin
that dress souls like gar-
ments that we peel off
at the end of a long day
we are raw and naked
and who to see us if not
just curtains &  hollow
bathtubs               filled
with aching spines that
carry heavy souls        and
what’s the point if nobody
asks to look inside anyway?          
tired of talk of skin and form
there is so much more to see    

just ask about
metamorphosis