Starry when the night began, we ran ran ran
along running water young enough to have no trace of age.
Alice strung out floating like the prettiest diamond
imaginable.

Kindly petting cheek then struck like a thunderous match,
her face glowed a sinking white-- a face made of candles
lit beneath plaque eye sockets, wildly staring blackness,
lips built on an unfamiliar shade of red,
Flaxen hair that sliced along gemstone irises;

I love love love you. Please, stay a while longer, long
enough to feel like forever-- although I know such is impossible--
Look at those seagulls feeding rain to the distant waves,
Wings soon to be scrambling overhead, let me read you a book
about a girl whom you were probably named after.

I will sing a lullaby and hold hold hold you in it for
as long as I can.

looking into
your eyes,
i wouldn't think
of getting lost
in them.

instead,
your eyes
are a getaway
where i find myself.

hijack a spaceship . . .
yeah, that should do it . . .

that’ll get me back to where I need to be;
just go as ‘up’ as possible . . .
cause, truly, I’m from up there, not down here.

but, not like heaven, or anything just . . up THERE! like, up there . . . like, space n stuff? I’m from somewhere in “outer space”.

first, I write the goodbye letters . . .
naaahh that’ll take too long, gotta get outta here NOW. so, we skip the letters, right? yeah, I think they’ll know “goodbye” when they see it . . .
secondly, (and you would think this step would include something like, “do research on how to operate a spaceship” but, see, there’s no logic in this place so, I might as well play along, right?) just report right on over to NASA, stealthily, blending in for a bit then
BAM, step C, I’m in the spaceship. And I’m the only one in the spaceship . . . I’m pushing all types of buttons n stuff and, somehow . . . it fires up . . .

that was it;
signing off . . .

The child in the pushchair leans forwards.
Touches the wheels while they move, later this revolves to watching wheels of a bus
and wishing to be
underneath
them and maybe we're all just looking for a way out and a getaway driver,
maybe this room with a view we built to ruin is flooding
and we're pressing our
open lips
to the ceiling, grappling for a last breath
and pushing time for a second more
and maybe that escape route is waiting round the corner, a lamppost with flowers cellotaped to it, a
place away from the place
our parents kicked us out,
drove us to the middle of nowhere and made us walk ourselves home, telling us this is a metaphor of life, waiting for a place for us to rest our blistered ankles and bruised wrists,
a place where there's someone we lost waiting for us, holding our their hand to bring us home,
but I guess,
maybe, for now
we're gonna have to stare at buses and wish for those pushchair wheels and the days we stared at the pavement moving beneath us and wanted to be anything
but a painting on the road.

Squalid off-white cube
fluorescent buzzing hue
water stained tiles
tribulation from digital files

dilapidated symbiote
invisible hungry parasite
optimism capsized in the abyss
tedium tongue french kiss

five hours a month
forest bathing in the sun
a cure they say
nature is a gateway

shambling down trails
languid gait sails
fractal patterns surround
tweets in background

head starts to clear
wondrous frontier
five hours a month
soaking in the sun

not enough time
to melt away grime
five hours a week
leaves a happier physique

summer sea breeze
rolling over unease
basking in the heat
leaving is so so bittersweet

return to human farm
pray for fire alarm
nature is a gateway
natures my getaway

Your eyes are the same green-blue of the ocean.
Your smile, as warm and bright as the sun.
Your laugh as welcome as the crash of the waves.
Your hands the sand caressing my body
        as I lay in your bed.
You are my getaway
And I never want to leave.