we twist, moths, to the light
in one another's eyes. this slow
dance, through loneliness. nothing
looks like all verdant expanses- thickets
of wind, icesheets. spread heart to
fragments; points of light above
borealis, your spinning skirt. daybreak.

eight-eight hundred is a ****** of
a number, though. all volume does
dissect, though: given time, pace.
sheets smooth.
tunnels of sharp rock, most days.

and here we step, tiny specks,
blinks apart, in coat of grand
nameless machinery. words
leak, as the length of
mid-afternoon; i can
barely breathe, sometimes,
stuck in these swales of
blush& noise. it is
wonderful, sometimes,
this slow twist under
city lights.

we dance, moths, around
this sharp-tongued
flame of worldly woe,
of each other's lips.

in singular dissection by batting lashes,
a regular pattern emerges:
to fall in eyes, change mind,
a hermitian allegory spun out
fingertips clustered on lies and
lonesome seeps in through the
concrete floor. i can't stand up.
i can't hold myself up, now.
i just collapse, most days.

the tides roll up and engulf the city in
a single blow. there is nothing but
drowning; i am so used to this that
i do not notice the corpses. just
my own, in the mirror. there
is no difference today. there is
nothing that is not the same.
the iteration carries through.

circles traced circles. curses
thrown to the wind. you don't
even know. you don't even
know. you don't even know
and i could just tell you.
but i won't. i'll just be sore
and sorry. bloodied, like usual.

and i can't hold myself up.

but i can carry you home,
tonight i could feign anything you
wanted of me. if only you'd want
some small ****** up something
like me.

if only

sometimes unsure just where the
            world spun: sharpness of
                    hour's turn, cardinal
direction. we found footsteps on
coasts, in leaf-litter, amongst
carpet fibre. our collective history
       in flecks; discretised, normal.
ain't so strange, windowlit dust's
      width your warmth felt, even
at metric distance. we were once
but a single heartbeat across:
    wavelet, hangin' in the wash.

   i want to fall asleep in
covers of snow, you and i
as tangled pile of bones. i want
our echoes intertwined in all
great halls. or
just
   one
          slow morning,
                       fog or no fog.

                                                       the world will spin under dark blankets
                                                             for all of our evers, at least. tumble n
                                                                                                                      fade.

moon stole the sunlight and, in mid-evening,
you could've seen the stars punch in,
with that consistent lack of effort;
the solid cycles, bound up against the patterned grain,
tracks hurried and buried in pitch,
asphalt markings on fingertips, molten and stained cliffs,
some temperate refrain, issued from distant speakers,
life winds springs and holds hope, moving on.

but, round the backs of tall thoughts,
meaningless as reason often finds itself,
that plot already jut out, churning,
and as a digital globe circled and lit up the whitewash,
the words on the wall, dried up, cold, and honest,
spoke volumes of rending misery,
split limbs, spilt cause, spent sleep.

and, now, this is the moment,
half-lip words, falling, ever so gently,
her rain, coating the floorboard dust,
already forgetting the rest,
the moment
promptly stood up
and left.

stone's throw.
lone crow, bent,
perched, on the back fence.
sometimes, i feel the warm
bent of misery,
washing, ocean's
leagues, untied, into
graceful plays, like
the hue shift of afternoons.
under clouds, feet shuffle
over n around n don't find
meaning out there in gutters
or supermarkets. it
is heavy but bearable.
                                                                                                           arcing over,
                                                                                            sky's cover, oblique,
                                                                                     hangs on the valleymist.
                                                                                 some days, feeling the soft
                                                                                                       hiss of static, i
                                                                                                          smile, out of
                                                                                            habit, or leaflitter, or
                                                                                               every vastness, like
                                                                          our echoes through space seem.
                                                                                     under canopy, feet rustle
                                                                              about, all muddied n finding
                                                       meaning don't matter, out here in hollows
                                                                                                     or grainfields. it
                                                                                       is dizzying yet bearable.

in the slow heaving of late
afternoons you
distill into columns, dusty
salmon painting mock
gold mirrors
under
the crowded blue, paling,
as
fragments tear
roll,
together, apart,
amidst
your
symmetric relationships, opening up
in
to
wings, in every direction, and
you
tear
my
head
right in half

sitting on the sky
doing all this nothing

my insides reel, as typical as could stay. only in slow coils, though. only in long sighs. still breathing, twinge of sad, but i saw your light in the sun. found peacefulness in moments between. gratitudes, to a world that somehow strung us up& out to turn to dust. and here i stand, slowly coiling into little little little happy dust. is that so strange. can't tell. don't mind.

Loose glasses shimmer beneath the tune of looser morals. I hear the drinks spatter, intention belied by raucous jest. Toupee like frayed lightning, red-nosed, he leads the pack, insists on staying drunk, rather than sitting at their table. Tones, moody, hypnotic, just waltz around the outer rings of paying ears. Customerial fashion: wax political, smug murmur; who will tip this French waiter the most? The electric wig stares vulnerability into my skin-grasping ensemble. A man in front of his wife, tongue spattering over my appearance, and tonight I can’t tell if he’s hitting on me, or if this is just how they always speak.

  French waiter saunters in through the corridor, kisses them all on the cheek, takes my hand. Lips two millimeters from my veins. Heart skips, slight. I feel his breath, there on my hand, for the next hour. I would have  kissed him back, if we didn’t have the same taste in men. All the waiters here have that effect. The phone chimes, me just some answering machine. Prerecorded. I feel like people call up, testing. Questioning: why a New Zealander at a French restaurant? Parlez-vous Francais?

  Most of the time, my eyes are torn to the wide glass walls, to the harbour. To get a glimpse of the lights on the palcid waters. Watching the sunset kiss the hilltops, draping its simmering cold cloak over the buildings, as tiny people race home to their absolute importances. Fires in houses turning on, as the spotlights on Te Papa fade to cold grey. My favourite place is the kitchen. Behind the glamour, the pale blues and pale pinks, lie these white tiles, this plain room, filled with chef-de-cuisine jokes, the pastry chefs acting out Statler and Waldorf; laughing together from their arches.

  Back at my desk, the night begins to diffuse in, a stalking black cat, no lack of prey. All that can be seen within the darkness are the crisp square windows of this conscious, some lone stranger walking against the water. Left to ponder his relentless thoughts. In another world, a customer offers his opinion; his companion purses her lips. Extended smile, occasionally, to relinquish some silent apology. I smile back in turn. Vicious cycle. Of course, she knows how I understand. Frequent reprimand: talking too much to customers. This relaxed manner of hospitality is lost to the French. How easy it is, to spot a New Zealander in this crowd. The profuse, oblate, continuous laugh. Goes up to the bar, grabs their drink with their own hands. Never let a chair be pulled from underneath you, never let a napkin fall into your lap. I can feel the radiant annoyance, the wait staff just trying to do their job.

  I absolutely adore it.

small chill sets through past& present
tides' turns; although, somehow, i've been
sweating more, lately. nerves, or insides
slowly lit& spread. but, if you truly
were wildfire (and, sometimes, you
are), i'd stay the kindling that i am,
anyway.
                   the light and
length of days
                              shuffle,
as normal steps, in this adjoining dance,
and i try not let it show but,
im still feeling the same.
still aching and burning.
little shivering hope, sat by a
little wavering candle, whispering:
you might change your
mind, but
people seem to stick to
their songs, and
i'm not quite sure if
you'll change your tune in time, but

i still adore you, so
i'll just keep waiting,
for now.

but i can walk around, having
written all the angles between
streets in the ravines in
my skin. and i can still
stare at the sky, from hilltops,
and know maybe the world doesn't
have to carry so much meaning or
get dizzy whilst spinning or even
notice that,
in its silhouetted waltz,
the moon, brilliant& alight, is quietly
headed out to sea.

I scarred the paintchips on a doorframe,
making my way through,
with wicker baskets of fresh cut
                         wine-white flame;
jutting, into that summer,
ready to empty my pockets
      of the careful pressure
  I'd built up behind ribs,
for a heart:
once in hand,
  beating and dreaming, alive,
like that wind I'd cherished,
   for its consistent transparency.

so, you,
  under the ocean of sheets, engulfed and over it,
and, I, well,
   I was wrong.
   I lost the match, to bled-green stares out of river stone eyes.

I was on your porch, it took seconds,
   a mere shadow, incarnate momentarily,
as
     the world derobed, curtain pulled back,
and bitter realization
           fell, like a single leaf, or a storm.

Left,
to stand by, and watch the feathers drop,
as that
   flock of birds,
    torn wider than the midland prairies,
                                 made patterned migration,
leaving my hands, cupped
and empty, same
  as I had started out,
   when I'd coursed the same mistake of
     letting the rain in,
      when I'd already drowned,
        time after time
          after time,
           before.

Wish i knew what to say or how to lift weight but remember, you are as you think. and i know it's hard, sometimes, to see the light that casts shade seemingly everywhere, but it can be as simple as turning eyes to the great warmth floating up on the sky and knowin' life is a joke if you make it through laughing, right?
we skim, as so many stones, on an endless pond's vague and indifferent face, more directions to feel than anyone can see, and lay, cold n warm, in alternate takes. but time continues inerrant, and the world slips through the sheets of everything, as always. through the bent sheathes, somehow, i felt the great warmth: now, not the cardboard circle in the sky, but inset, on firm land, lapping in waves, far over and under each depth; right down to the last, misery, where sometimes i sit and wait, knowing you visit, too.
so keep lifting yr lips and
  tryin' to swim, and
i'll do the same,
                      okay?

two seconds,    i planned
just one moment to love you,
but  those two seconds    drag on:
                          two hundred days, a smile, a night's passage,
                            two years, another winter;
                  leave, return, repeat.
this cycle of wanting you,
  and never wanting to
                       but, who am i,
           to tell me what to do?
                              two weeks, a pulling of sinew:
                                            an arm loose,
                        a finger,                   tracing lines on the floorboards
                                   'cause i don't
                                               want to stand up,
anymore.
                           i'll just lie here,
                      ok?
            like i lie to you,
every time i don't speak,
hoping you will,
hoping you'll say,

                   you're not sorry
anymore.

we were wandering down the side of the highway, pickin' blackberries on the way back to the car. this'd hit my mind many times over the past week, and will probably continue out into the future:

there's somethin' ticking away in there, makes me shrink away from humanity, despite the loneliness i ain't wanna amplify any. words i need to say crop up, out of the blue mist of living, and internally i make all the motions to spread 'em out, see the way my hands, lips would move, in exact musculature sweeps. but it don't follow through.

is this leavin' blues? that if i shrink away from those who care, it'll be easier to let go once more? or just an excuse for laziness (fairly sure 'twas for the last month or so, last city)? if i swore i'd love equally and with open heart, why can't i keep eye contact, even with my own cousin? is this penance for all ashamedness i can't slip from my hands?

i'm full of excuses and few good ones. i am changing and learning to let go, but understand that perhaps i need to learn to hold on a little better. is it possible to figure it out before true wrenching loss colours my palette? or is it necessary to keep shedding skin to find meaning?

don't know how to express fully how much people mean to me, and can't seem to do anything in a half-measure. is it okay to settle for flawed motions, to prevent from seeming bored? to act as i see through in others, find of little use; is it instead endearing, or even just to confer base notions in a derobed manner?

how do these shells come away? how do these walls tear down?

sugar i
am carried on lofty currents,
days like this. days
evaporating, caught in
tumult. hands, caught between
bricks. banks of
simmering stormcloud.
outside, in the throes of
daisy-speckled fields, i
am found with the taste
of your syllables tucked
just behind the lip. thought
convolving, shifting dot,
position, tangent; no simple
question. just combination:
these speckles i know, the
silhouette of
your face in
each blink. the
warmth of this soft hum, when
i sing, to the world, of your
radiant heart.

last time, before i
slept, i felt the huge vast
emptying of the housing
of myself. the
feel of melatonin, shape
of space too impossible
to occupy. coalescing thoughts
as a pearl bound in ring of
starlight.
and i rolled out of my body
& stepped acres
& came alight beside the
porching of your own,
and, in whatever moment's motion
you were carried through, i
saw
faint blue, pulse in your neck,
and lay my hand on your cheek,
and was happy
a lasting moment
until i didn't exist.

lost, one rung out through the scrub.
nothing i didn't need
anymore. matagouri beneath
heavy soles, the speargrass gave
me new skin. evenings
glazed over quick. dreams
curled up in my sleeping bag,
never touching me, dragged
'em to the tops, shook
'em out. i can sleep fine, now.
even in retreat, bathed in city
lights, foraging without snow,
gulping down the same old
chlorine i had lived with. oh,
antiquated i, now so deep in the
murk of this tunnel passed. i'll
make sure to miss you, albeit
minimally.

the cairn crop will spread out,
encompass frivolous dust-clouds;
from lowlands i shall stamp up
out of this trench i've so
meticulously hollowed. taste of
new victory fresh on tongue,
knuckles torn, eyes bright.

oh, new skeleton. nothing will
halt these unfurling wings.

got caught in this small, fine-crafted world:

with half-moon indents below flittering
eyelids, with new rotation about iris,
embers under cloud sprawl, bloodshot from
  later
on in the night. with reveries hung out,
with sharp fog covering the evening: i
misplaced most sensibilities, i
clambered down from
this ridgeline, hope,
for god knows
whatever
reason. i
stood still, continually incapable of translation,
scrambling for word-count, the inside of my chest.

with new broken bones,
some impossible heaviness,
some insurmountable hopelessness:
soft poison, self-administrated;
i'll still climb back up, though,
given any fractional semblance of luck.

we've all been burnt, yeah,
but if you'd take this
half-exhausted charcoal splintering
heart in flax-woven basket up,
i will do my best, to
nurture your own back to
meadowlark wings your
breath takes flight upon, in
interstitial moments, as
your quiet lips
  turn to smile& glow.

tie up, covet space and
wind wound round to
collect all thrown away.
  this is the gutter that seeps;
  this is where my sedimentation begins,
  pure, anew:
the base culvert of societal demands,
a miserable brand name:
i curled inside the hollow inside of
you devoted to my coveture. all just

false lashes. i can
read into nothing, too. i
can subsist like the
consistency, consumption or
delegating i. this destitute
diplomacy. i can
let go without blinking.

  or at least, i would've wanted to.
but
  you know better. with
  teeth, you read desperation
  on the architecture of my lips.
a hand cast
  a shadow on me to show some
  substance. bare fangs and
  open up. new space unfolds.
  with clarity, i pretend to see.

i can be patient,
but plans fall apart.
  i can't wait forever.

gut feeling: constant apprehension.
side remark in meaning;
eager set on nothing.
oh, hardly worth noting,
this ambivalence, in charcoal type.

impressed god, wild&
bewildered, singing
all the small while:

forgot the notions and mentions;
stuck in some gutter,
far-field,
semi-breathing,

semi-breathless.

slate landlock, quaternary headspace open to face the light,
feel better, knowing it'll improve.
live life like
two drops from separate sinks, in simultaneous drive.
get it over with, there'll be time to breathe,
time to resolve that pressure,
building under left temples and fourth knuckles,

it's never been as easy as this to **** everything up.

it's never been such an opportune day.
shut the window and watch leaves fall,
let it all pass.
feel worse, just keep telling lies, keep making mistakes.

always sorry, I make amends,
to break the slender branches
over and over, anyway;
fall down and sigh,
run away and
I'm so **** scared that everyone will see me
for the frightened child
I never grow out of.

the broken wings
I'd made those aching flight plans for
bled out:
open plain smoke
for seventeen nights,
days,
and the boundary crossings between them.

so, that vast sky,
built of shards and shards and shards,
oppresses, on high,
still, above, ruminating or dwelling,
upon cold response;
like I,
the small thing, on a small rock,
too afraid of heartspace or,
second takes
or,

just,
I'm sorry,
for the ******* I am.

dawn's echo, tender or fierce,
takes grip of looser teeth. these
loser teeth, i won't eat anything
(again).
this cold, immutable. frost-
bushed lungs. you'll
figure it out before i do.

one by one, my motives
are culled,
sugar for some crueler
weather's onset. i just
wait, and in the end
lament all stillness. peace
takes time, but mine is
all wasted. as if i'd drink less,
though. you'll get sober and
i'll find another gutter.

for a moment, i
believed i'd turn out
okay. i just lost sleep
instead. dreamt of nothing.
you are what you dream.
wake up earlier every
day. turn. pass time inside
another headache.

this crestfall yields but
permanence. make it out
south. i could drown i could
drown i could drown i
could drown but my lungs
are already full of water.

it might be easier like this. lull, time, old notions. i
tell stories, not for any kind of living - save a richer
internal monologue - but, instead, to know that our
thoughts suffice to change the world around us. to
weave fiction so tightly into the earth, that it cannot
help but become truth. the longest story, the one i
could never put down, will always unfold:

most of the time, it was dark. without corners
to sweep this dark into, the world decayed into
modes of static blips. fumbled sparks, outside,
where i felt lawn between my toes, but knew not
of collections of blades. cold, a shade merged with
the remaining ripples. its exterior product, a
binding over my skin. one often knows not that,
sometimes, they cast their own snares (wrote that
a while ago, though. my own cruel traps.), and
sit and wonder who was so thoughtless as to
leave them out. dream of wakefulness. spend
days without movement, spent-up significance.
and there i was, collection of nested shells in the
backyard. concentric. so elated in the safety. my
sweet guardian, the embrace of stillness. left
wondering why i felt so alone, in crowded
hallways and streetlamps.

it was millenial, or epochal, sleep that kept me in there,
so long. the sparks spun under creation and annihilation.
and i, omniscient and blind, slunk out under a grin to
acknowledge the efforts. the pains of a sudden and bright
world. the fleeting hand of sweetness. and i stood, stone,
and knew to feed a fraction of it was only the more painful,
but that my crumbling surface was still too rough to give
it all away. always too early in the game. and i saw lakes,
from afar, and ached for all time, or just enough to lose
breath. i saw dazzling pinnacles and wished i were the
rain, for at least when water freezes, it is beautiful-
not chaotic and terrified. i had no facade of ice, though.
through to the roots, i was always
the same as the sun;

fissuring warmth, upon small bands.

it was just a single sliver of all time that
split every wall, though. i was at rest,
as eternal. the sound was impetuous, yet
left a permanent ring in my unfurling ears:
i heard your song. heard it ring out, forever.
awash with new & unfound oceans, i stretched
my wingspan wide and tugged at the seams
in the wallpaper. i pled, and cried out to
this new universe. to have known everything,
but only of a tiny & compact void. and, then,
i understood the shade. with bright light,
we see into darkened corners. the world is
a slipping tether.

i hold my eye up close, to the window,
and now know the majesty of my
so-called eternity was a ripple in a
footpath puddle. i grasp at the cracks
in the walls. i tear at them 'til my hands
bleed. i am but a small bird, stuck in
a nest of my own construction. but, i
have plans. but, i'm learning to fly, to
get back to the great glowing
shine, up above:

to bring back all the warmth, and lay, gently,
by your side, in new nest; this vast world,
and to never stop humming.

residue, she switches like
clean plastic circuits under
my fingernails. two minutes
breaking down, all it took.
even moving parts from afar
seem placid. could've sworn
i heard just one of your
heartbeats. could've sworn i
was underwater at one or another
point i'll become lack-
lustre and you can change your
mind. no trace of blame. long
after this fact you'll still be
a recurring theme on the
back of my palm as skin shifts
in colourless hues inside
sleep. no matter which hand
i write with, your name
looks the same. shines.

i bide motion, sit still,
as the earth revolves around
something new.

from another side of a window,
a shadow permanently cast:
disinterest licks lips. like i ain't
care to know. as if time were
our great merchant, as if wares
bought ashore were something
more than summarisable.

doubt, crushingly, descends.
the shore-lined, i, sent moral
and virtue on pieces of 'hear',
& a little less say. words
falter; left to hang, unimaginatively,
like candles under the thatched
ceilings of humanity. oh,
how we were led to the water.
taught to breathe. how were we
ever pure? some animal below,
some eternity at fingertrim.

can't believe this freedom,
of sailing above standing
waves. set-out regularities.
wrought up a smile with
alligator teeth. dust's song.

yet another 2:01am.

days dance down on strings i so often mean to
tug at, yet end up leaving, to dangle loose in
the semblance of breeze we pass between. caught
yr eyes like an ocean. made an idea, but don't got
the follow-through. it's easy to stay still; is it so bad?
is it so bad? here, i find way less dreams, but less don't
destroy me a thing. so i'll just keep on & breathe, & cut out in
the long haul. i can't keep this up. such a waste, in so
many colour schemes. pretendin' i ain't losin' sleep. i fell deeply. i fall
always. and if it's you, well, it's you; and i don't pretend anymore like
i know the world for certain, or even that the world can be certain. i don't
have a clue & thus love all of the intolerable patterns in their in-
evitablity: what makes you, me n' everything else. so, don't give up. don't
give up, just keep going & i will go, too. and if you move along i
promise not to get so ****** up about it, & if we don't move i'll
shoulder my half of the blame & love you even more. not like
i wouldn't anyway, not like i'd say it anyway.
                  - the city just shrinks, and where i've slept -
                                                               ­                    shoot, i'm not
losing anything. thought i'd lost it all, but there is no loss!
there is only what you hold, but it is all grains of sand & they
do all slip, eventually, otherwise the ground would just be rock.
  silt & loam, the world is now rich and fragrant with my lost
friends, it needs 'em more'n i do, i'm happy, i'm exploding
with light in this evening. i can smell the toxins leaking.
i'm sorry i've been so **** down, but it's only 'cause i keep
missing you so much. so much. so very much, but it only
hurts happy & my sweetnesses grow by the second & i hope
you feel the warmth every morning, the light i blot up
to save the sky from this endless night we sometimes can only see.

if only you open your eyes and shift to smile in the glow.
here i will be, in flesh & bone, crossing electrons over your lips.

a dull and cyclic shimmer
on the surface of a slow
life, an evaporation held under
the fingertips of passage.

priority, like the flow
of days ain't matter
much.
the mind reels.

importance once was mulch,
out in the garden.

this new foraging-ground,
syllables, all good exists
as the shadow of action. all
evil lies in the same stroke.

under heaving clouds, dissolving
we, sway with or without purpose.

say you knew certainty,
for i can barely imagine truth.

a small & flittering day.

sat in the back seat, watching the hills cladding SH2 go by, with a tightened silence all over my face, couldn't help reflect:

sometimes it digs deep down into me, thinking of all the conceptions planned out that i was considered to have aligned with, but can't bring myself to think the same. to what degree am i the image of failure in all my leader's and follower's books? all simply for abiding by ideologies that seem to occur naturally.

but, am i failing myself and, transitively, failing more critically henceforth, if i disavow my own convictions for sake of demonstrating love to those i care the most for? is it worse to disappoint my parents, who've thrown large parts of their lives to the wind for my sake; my friends, who've laid down their loyalty for knowing, mutually assured, that collectively our virtues are assured; to weaken strength or trust in other's eyes for the sake of my own moral solidification?

or to let my very self evaporate slowly away, a puddle left out under the bright light pouring from their hearts?

clambers thus far, the
small-clawed creature inside of
me now; in dreams said
she misses me, but dreams
are just that. classical
case. eyes untouched. gaze
unmet. notions uniformly
forgotten, or forgetting, at
least. the sun rises, the sun
rises oh, am i warm or just
asleep?

in a haze of morning hours, scrambling for paper, amidst regular intervals of tingling:*

days splintered by loveliness, sharp aches,
clustering thoughts of blue snares. summer's
decline. your eyes. tumult.

but, what can or can't be done? seemingly
everything. i just hide. second nature.

paradise by weekend, far reaches
before long. isolation held in
firm grip. substitutions for the
lonely: mud, rock, leaf, water.
simplicity.

and then, as clear as sunlight,
another visage of your eyes,
grand blue snares;
a warm, glowing scar,
i am full of glimmer and
a recurrent dull ache. can't
help it. don't stop.

affections ran deep like
trenches, swift like gutters,
rained upon, forever.
nameless breath sent to or from
this greater scheme,
the mechanics of my inner chest,
sorrow poured out over the stars.
all seemingly as distant.
i miss you always.

but, you, wild& capable,
carrying everything with a grin,
give no reason for lament.
you, out there, behind doors
or in thickets, thatching all
skies with rivets of joy.

and, i, under slow-beating sun,
ain't seen to smile so much in
forever. but all flying creatures fly.
as misery did migrate, so too
do fear and consistency, heartache
and certainty. such is the path the
world will always spin over.

so, i write out new and old songs
on rust-laden heartstrings. lay
lips on nothing, typically. keep on
breathing, singing, laughing and
spinning, as the world does, knowing
all the while that in the recesses of
my chest you'll be somewhere, spinning
all the same, and i'll just be here,
poring over paper, trying to
figure the right pattern, to
speak words language won't.

i'll miss you, always.

hope called through a
window's pane, the scratch
marks in the single glaze
opens my letters; they
sit down to honeyed
conversation out in
the back yard. my throat
rakes small tendrils
billowing up through
the gravel, i slumber
cradled between soft
hot patches of afternoon, i
call nobody lover but misery,
still.

moribund, late light
crosses the neighbour's
rose bushes and cries
from the fenceline. all
is broken like me, but i
do it better. that, i promise.

now, finally slowing in eyelid
beat counts, my dreams tell
truths of my own small life; the
ones i won't dare live by, but
instead lay down and watch
ribs lain below
asbestos skin: i lose
hope's screaming in the garden,
knowing no fingers would want to
cross their lines,
who'd edge up to ****** up
tired little i?

Some-times in the cast
shade of beauty, life,
our greatest glories feel
the most hollow of
them all, having
dispersed continuously through
our pre-aspirations
& post-adulations. The
only true full-
complement of joy
passes through us, as
a breeze of no measure; we
are doomed never to linger
on contentedness for
more than a
moment's
breadth.

i scatter breadcrumbs pre-dawn as
your light draws into
this empty hemisphere: full of
life, lack of the
sweetness dwelling behind eyelid's
closure i
was awake to monitor the slivered
rim, the same stars as glow
soft around your engorging pupils.
gutterwork about fingertip traces.
i can almost see
your ghost. no smoke entices
my lips, not yet. i've
no need to any longer sing
of meaningless vices. i've
got bigger things hefting
weight over my shoulders. i'm
running short of endlessness.
yet, from the guts of this library
some lie dissolves.
my body vanishes through painted
concourse. the finer points scatter.
the big picture rushes to shake
hands, to distil spine. between
us, there ain't nothin' new
anywhere. so, i throw back
some mineral-heavy water to
wade back out of the ocean:
a slow headache, a continual loss
i drown myself in. i could
get outta here and increasingly want to.
increasingly want (well, this part is easy).

fine sliver of dawn crawls
through cloud, through boughs;
here, a punctuation by curtain-
hole. song in seven beaked
tongue, held tender in
imperfection. notes carved of
century's trickle. dreams swell
down to quick: dilate through
signatures of some familiar
reality. diluting in the
effervescence of waking
thought. only ever dreamt in
colours of you, out under fields
of stars. oh!, to lay down fresh
tracks; on& ahead to meadows,
to sleep.

long breath raked out, length of
day. thought pattern diffusing;
shadows cast on a broadening strip,
wallpaper hung close. stolen breath,
an orbit about you. consistent
glow. hinging on ripples, cut around
this field by clear breeze. branches
stretch, churning in the swept
air. held aloft, in their self-arrest.

i do not echo. this frictionless glimmer.
the vanishing extent to which i
can stop falling.

oh, but i do not want to. not
this time, sweet. each day reaches
out with tender hands, to pull
me up& out of this cavernous maze;
undoing meaningless shovelwork.

i find myself, under boughs, amidst
flowers. it's only slightly difficult to admit
this smile was smeared over
my freckling jaw, for nothing,
save for you.

even birdsong seems pale in comparison,
distant bells, ocean mist; undertow
beneath soft waves rolling
from your lungs to lips.