Is it not magical, fantastical, terrible
the way my body expands and contracts
like a peach balloon
the more or less I digest.

If I wind mental stitches through
my oesophagus - my bones call
to the skin,
reel it in. ten million krill
trapped in the suction
of the line of a fisherman.

In gluttony, the same line
spills, the tide swells
and multiplies cells
Lipids blossom and my waistband
leaves a discrete red line of rubble
on the shore.

I rotate around you
on a slanted axis that
shows you more of my left side
and less of my scarred eyebrow.

If I were a whale
my phonic lips could sing
the distance away
through an acoustic habitat

but I must rely on outer space
to deliver my love call
in tact - for I cannot shout
loud enough,
I am too human

I am too small
for this love, I can't make
it reach you,
you're too far away.

she lived on the only street
in Rattenberg, the smallest village

in all Austria. because it was all
she knew
and all she loved.

in the summer, she lived in the
kitchen
away from the flies and
the itching glow of the sun

sketching designs of glass crystal
and playing records
her father played from his armchair
when she was young.
the blinds closed, the shadows

of pedestrians drew sloping
templates of bodies large and thin
she guessed their faces and painted
girls with small noses and round chins
and made the men look like him.

her sister, from the neighbour town
called in the winter months, when
Rat Mountain devoured the sun and left
Rattenberg in day-night. she invited her
on walks, said it was not good
for her complexion to live in shadow

unmoved, she
preferred instead to pace the only street
in the welcome midday greyness
and smile quietly
at the pale faces she passed

when plans rumbled of a
contraption of mirrors to steal
the day's shine from her sister's town
she prayed to the moon

he would let them leave her alone
in the shadow of Rat Mountain
a child of the night

the girl who preferred the dark to the light
the lady-moth determined to stay in flight.

Lips around the base
of a sweetcorn yellow balloon
expanding, turning translucent
its atoms straining, reaching
in a purple attempt to touch fingers
with the next.
Inside, my mirrored breath in lungs
incapacitated
and dry. Sand,
they brought deck chairs and lay
beneath my expanding solar
bubble I am
cultivating, in a gassed
mansion of glass
oblivious. Singed edges
and twisting cells replicating
they laugh in cones and
board planes until there's a

Bellow
And without
Nourishment the balloon
Gulps to die.

Each day the wood-chipped path
would creep in through lace holes
and scrawl its earthen signature
upon her socks.

Collared wind blew
the secrets of the leaves through a tangle
of whistling hair

The labelled trees, landmarks to tourists
on the nottinghamshire tree-trail
reached to her
when she froze on the bench
to miss the dining hall.

birds of paradise
chirping in a minor lament
of their chicken-wire palace
understood,
only.

when they drained the lake to search
for a body,
and the parched park cried leaf-crisps
in red and orange, they were warned
from walking alone
and the grass stretches ached for
musing students to sprawl
chatter on its back.

then, as seasons cast a veil
on the rumours and caution,
she was
taller, and handed
to a boy.
they deciphered
the war memorial's
foreign symbols
for something to talk about.

The arboretum watched her grow:
each day the wood-chipped path
would creep in through lace holes
and scrawl its earthen signature
upon her socks.
When she could walk on her own
the rustling blows tugged
the secrets of the leaves through the hair
she refused to fasten;
so it danced, rebelliously
on her shouldered landscape.
The labelled trees, landmarks to tourists
on the nottinghamshire tree-trail
linked outstretched arms in solidarity
around her when she froze on the bench
to skip the dining hall.
And the birds of paradise
who chirped in minor a lament
of their chicken-wire palace,
understood, when no one else could.

When they drained the lake to search
for a body,
and the parched park cried leaf-crisps
in red and orange, they were warned
from walking alone
and the grass stretches ached for
musing students to sprawl
chatter on its back.

When the time-dust sprinkled a veil
on the rumours and caution,
She appeared
taller, and hand in hand
with a boy.
They tried to decipher
the war memorial and it's message
in foreign symbols
for something to talk about.

The Arboretum has not seen her for
years,
but its crafted script
Is carved like wax in
her mind's journal.

It is time
that devours us
In its envelope of becoming
It yearns for our uttermost
Rose-flamed desires
For its own
immortal daybreak.