Breast stroking through silent movies of cities
soft and solemn under brine, I twirl past
balustrades of jagged coral lining the royal road
as the day leaks down as blood from wounds
not yet salved,

dreaming in tangerine veils as frozen black mouths
spit silver-lined bullets of mackerel  through
barnacled labyrinths of high-rise stone
for clinging life as

seahorses waltz ethereal through the
depth’s crushing grip, their duelling coronets
figure-eighting above trumpet snouts and platinum
scales, over gulping abysses that rip away my reverie,

so I leap up slow through salt molasses, up through
parting schools of glinting plankton and layer cakes
of placental warmth,
webbed fingers ripping
back leather curtains of
manta rays and jewelled blobs
of ocean circuitry to rise toward
                 l  i  g  h  t
         f
     a
          l
              l
         i
                n
            g      
               like milk into tea to
erupt dripping in revelation
as the world      
                       d
                          i
                           v
                            e    
     into my eye  s  *****, shrieking
amphetamine through grey folds
as sheets grip tight with well-tucked
                         hands.