I came from the old times dancing on a
hillside which toppled into lakes, tipping
down into endless valleys of green and
blue, my hands in the palms of a stranger.
I kissed him under fog as the oil rigs
skittered across the water, finches swooping
to protect their young. As a laughing melody
hummed between us, electric and satisfied,
I felt our hands shining so brightly in
the darkness around. I sang an old song
in the woods and it echoed back to me.

Roots run deep and wild. At first they lay quiet,
toes buried in moss, and I wondered if
the leaf felt my touch as silken, smooth as
water, or jagged as the stones beneath
it. And then they were livid, raging, boiling
under the surface as I stood above
screaming water, churning the earth from the
edges of the river, eating away
at the land I was bound to. Desolate
and sodden, I faltered on the borders
of my home town, longing for the heaviness
of salt to catch on my tongue once more.

And then I changed, or grew, and forgot what
it was I had lost. Now, looking down upon
empty forests, I no longer remember
the song they are singing, yet I hear the scent
of a dead earth, the sound of a mushroom
breaking at the stem. Lying on lamenting
sands, I feel a droplet land on my cheek
and, for a moment, feel a whisper
of home. Carrying my feet from the meadows,
I'll mutter softly, singing my melody alone.

How I feel, it's a sin, longing to be
something I've lost again. I can't find your
eyes in the crowd, yet the burn of your hands
still lingers on mine as our fingers reach out
across a breath of wind, desperate, calling
through the abyss, calling to be heard.
Blundering and old, I have begun to
long for you in that ancient, harmonious
way, mouth wide open, feet swinging
high above the ground. In between wisps of
dreams, I feel your hands in my hair telling
me all the secrets of the world, dark eyes
shining through the confusion. You
unravel me and leave me glowing on
the horizon, my body turned to ice
under invisible hands. Your trickling
words weigh me down, stick to my skin like tar
and feathers, itching. In silence, I can
taste the ghost of you on my tongue, honeycomb
bursting between my fingers. You crumble
before me, sugar on my limbs, but I
can't get the bitter taste out of my mouth.
I feel you echoing over my skin
and, for a moment, the warm of your breath
blazes on my lips. And then we fade,
dissipate, cold hands grasping at the sheets,
whimpers bouncing over the grey waves.

To the bone I am becoming,
losing track of what I wanted to be,
I'll find myself being pencilled in
with grayscale tones painted over me.

To the bone I am becoming,
break my fingers, my limbs and my soul,
you'll touch me as you wish, burning me thin,
'til I'm fragile - no parts of a whole.

To the bone, I am becoming,
even though I'm desperate to try,
because all I can taste is your hands on my skin
and bitter and dark was the fight.

To the bone, I am becoming,
I'm addicted to losing control.
My bedroom is littered with matchsticks and gin,
To the bone
To the bone
To the bone.

Vulnerable years gave me sound advice
and I turn it over in my mind.
The advantage of sadness took my voice,
crumbled it,
sealed away my words
and left me to become unusually communicative
in my own reserved ways.
I understand that I maintain habits of a curious nature,
that I make you the victim
of sleep, preoccupation, hostility.
I know the secret griefs of your wild, unknown hands.
The way you love me
is laced with plagiarism and gesture,
filled with opposite alphabets and slurred speech.
I may be destitute and old
but my skin will weep for you,
my body will be soft,
my words will linger like syrup
in the cracks of your palms.
After an unknown point,
I won’t care what I’m made of.
Judging you is constant waiting and infinite hope.
I am certain that my decency will become snobbery,
that my tolerance will fade
and I will become impatient.
East from here, west from here,
is the sun – uniform, under intricate attention.
If I am the unbroken chain
of successful gestures,
my body is but betrayal
waiting to be unearthed.
Will my repulsive nature
disturb your peace,
the way you rest so unattainable, so beautiful?
What foul dust floats in the wake of your limbs,
so close to the useless sorrows of younger men?
It was a prominent, descending tradition
of pride and fault.
You were supposed to look like him,
a delayed man from long ago,
the centre of the world.
You bubble and boil and brood
and I make you restless
in a warm, wide season.
Too warm, too wide.

I remember the morning being bitter,
harsh wind bruising my forearms,
skin prickled and rough.
I had cruelty within me until I saw you
and my body shifted in time,
dimensions warping
around my self,
the fabric of space
weaving around my body.

Insulation.
Steel beams tremble under the weight
of you. Eyes, effervescent light
making the shadow beneath me
midnight grasping the earth,
pulling it into an embrace.
My heart jitters at the scent, the memory.
I cannot forget the sun in my eyes
blinding me, the sound of the ocean
seeing the city for the first time.
Now there are waves rushing against
the window panes, sand piling
at the front door.
You got what you came for
yet you never want to leave.
I think I can still breathe you
if I remember the line, the rhyme,
the way you held mine as your own.

Something.
Something about my history haunts you.
I will be heard.
You will feel heat you never knew,
have black spots in your vision
for the rest of your life,
the shape of my fingers tattooed
on your shoulder.
Hearts will blister, birds will sing,
I will fall in love over and over
again
again
again
until I have used up
every atom, every cell
blooming in a dark corner.
They can believe that happiness
is a dying song
but it screams

its way from beneath the earth,
explodes, blossoming and blossoming
into colours that don't exist,
feeling you never touched before.
It quakes and shatters and convulses
in the dark
but tells those who are lost
the way home,
tracks my hands to guide the marks
of my paint on the page.
Language, rhythm,
trace my body
and love me to the grave,
keep me in my place,
whisper to me
who I should love, who I should worship.

You. Always, only you.
Old eyes, you feel past lives
crooning, cocooning your arms
and breathing in your scent.
You know how to find light,
you know how to make my eyes blur,
to make me adore the world I see in prisms,
shifting angles. I love to an extent
no one will ever understand.
I love to an extent
that I am apart from the world.
I feel the joy of the planet,
fell in love with sight and transparency
long ago. Colour sighs
for she is weary, lost to war
and dust, but I will never forget
when she danced in the air,
illuminated particles, infinitely suspending them,
freezing them in time.
I remember how she laughed
when she stained your face yellow,
creeped into your eyes,
golden hours
spent on nothing at all.
I remember morning warmth
drenching my limbs in beauty,
breathing softly
to the whisper
of your heartbeat.

The ice was thick on the hill
but I don't remember being afraid,
only the warmth of my breath
on my frosted tongue.
I had put my feet against the ground,
hopped from place to place,
prayed to the earth
so She would forgive me,
but winter is unforgiving.
I remember the smell of wet soil, rot,
the snapping of twigs
as I fell backwards.
An eternity
all at once,
the boiling sky blurred, rolled,
my limbs calling
for the silence,
my spine meeting stone and fury.
Agony, relief,
sliced me open.
I remember trying to stand,
how my feet wouldn't move
even when I pleaded with them,
begged them
to forgive me.
How black blood is
when it pools in your eyes,
how hot
and itchy, molten,
against your eyelashes.
It doesn't hurt
when your lungs fill with blood,
it feels warm.
Like a mother comforting you,
screaming for help,
asking why she wasn't told,
grasping the arms of doctors
and patients.
Losing patience,
too much blood on her hands,
it felt like thistles, weeds,
reclaiming my skin
and repossessing my breath.
Drag me under a blanket of moss
and cherish my open wounds -
I created a valley of red,
crimson, so bright
they all fell in love with me,
my namesake.
I contracted, clotted,
but there was still blood within me.
I was still alive
yet no bleach could remove
the stains from my surface,
it left its mark
in scars and the dark
and all that remains
is two eyes peering
at me.

Where is my language
and why can't I speak it?
It's being replaced
with a haze of Spanish eyes
and olive skin
casting shadows across itself
in the mid-morning sun.
I would be one
to remember the days
of what I could say,
words integrate,
binding my tongue to the roof of my mouth.
Colder, colder, migrating south,
hold my hand and tell me
it will be alright.
I wanted to know how the bird in flight
felt to have its feathers washed from its body,
how the decaying leaf
felt to be buried in snow.
And now all I want to know
is how it would feel
to be the world's smallest organism.
How it would feel to divide, divide,
roots so shallow I can't find my feet,
swept away by the smallest rush
of pins pushing against my body.  
How it would feel to be torn apart
in the name of science -
would I still be beautiful
if my ribs were inside out?
Would I still be beautiful
if my heart bloomed like the winter flower?
Would you love me if I could be anything,
a wasteland with a clear surface,
water being poured down the drain?
If I was a sequence,
the number of steps before the next system over,
would my DNA align just enough
to make me reflect you?
I'm hapless,
lethargic,
entirely theoretical,
and I'm counting the number
of substitutions I can make
before I no longer exist.
What will it take to wipe me away?
How many cells do you have to remove from my spine
before it is no longer my own?
I used to want to feel
the air breathing with me,
to know what it is
that makes the water love the earth so dearly.
Now all I want to feel
is soft skin on my hands,
the curve of my waist as I sleep,
the skin pale under the sheets,
beauty sighing from between my blue lips.