i met the girl
with the marbled skin
in the bus queue
drunk, naked white arms, getting wet,
pressed against me in the darkened apron
a friend of someone who called me friend
but whose name or face or accent
I forgot within a season
of course i noticed her scars
shiny, thick, swirls of burnt skin
on cheeks, arms, hands;
some the very shape of the bandages
which held them in place
when she was a baby
pink chewing gum stretched over
ankles and elbows
she was funny
sharp and attentive
she half squinted her eyes
when she listened to me
i knew she was watching
me watching her plump wet lips
painted metallic pink
pushed into a betty boop square
by her cheek patches
she gave male celebrity names
to her huge *******

we sat together on the top deck and talked
so feverishly we missed a fight
at the back of the bus
(not so much a fight, an ambush
the tipsy, loud, student
was never in a position
to return a blow
- even if he did have the skill or fire -
after the local boy’s heavy boot
crashed into his jaw)

when I met her again
after the summer
we matched like socks
no words or hesitation
no doubts
we shared every sofa, room, bed
we ate together, smoked together,
missed lectures together,
and drank so often and so hard
our friends
- also students, drinkers, fiends -
warned us to settle down

in the mornings
when i lay in bed with a silent goth
a bipolar italian
a hairy, angry artist
a tiny farm girl
i would text her
and beg her to come save me

in the end it was our
not having ***
that tore us from each other
when we slept naked
on her mattress on the floor
i never shuffled over in the black
never reached out for those scarred limbs
of polished wood
or those heavy folding *******
i just slept
the sleep of the dead
while she read oscar wilde
wearing nothing but a head torch

her flatmate
two years older, wake and baker,
mass of curly hair and scarves and books
burst in one night
demanded to know
if we were having ***

and our peers kept misunderstanding
demanding
that we either **** or marry
(or preferably both, in that order)
kept asking what we did at night
two naked adults
must surely be rutting
putting ourselves
inside one another
do it or stop it
get on with it or stop pretending

she began to listen to the whispers

one night she asked me why i didn’t view her
as a woman
i said i did
but more importantly as a friend
it was easier for her to think
i found her ugly
than to realise i found her
much too beautiful