Lest the gamers forget the petals doused with blood,
Slayers bequeath their chine.
The guidance of wisdom is deemed for crud,
The sparkle of existence lay bare on the line.
Mockingbirds lost their techniques,
Before dipping their feathers in grizzling red.
Their sentiments shut along their broken beaks,
Symphonies out of tune,
Recorded grünes are that of the dead.
Long lasted the gloom of winter,
As if protected by a permanent warrant.
The only bids are that of a sprinter,
Losing his soul for a bribe, or the steams of the first torrent
How loathsome becometh the living, in a world rotten and vile,
Even I don't guarantee forgiving
For that, I'll set my sail and be gone for a while

His laugh, a summer carnival, spinning rides that make our stomachs do the same, cheeks kissed soft rose by blush of winter air, hands dyed permanent blue from weather, the absence of circulation, rough palms but soft touch, a red nose when seasons change, the outline of muscle pushing through skin, hair pale from the sun, and too much patience, always

My silk sewn blanket from childhood tucked into bed with me every night

The dog with a slobbering mouth and a human-like smile

The German Shepard with a grizzling bark mistaken for violent

He tells me,
"I don't wanna love somebody else"
He says,
"I don't know how to"

The copper guitar pick, the candle we dip wax fingers in, the Polaroid print from an angry night out, my crumpled side of the sheets

I grab the back of my neck like the hold of it will keep me grounded
I bite my lip until it bleeds for a sense of familiar pulling

In between the pages of a dust-covered book, kept quietly on a shelf,
This,
is where I hide love.


I am piling these moments like unread obituaries, unnoticed loss to someday be recovered
Maybe these deaths were never written down to begin with

Off somewhere in mountains, a place I could not pinpoint on a map, the outline is as faded as time has swallowed us whole

I still sleep wrapped up in childhood but the nightlight is missing now

A grave by a train track holds the body of the animal that grew up with me

I am no longer fearful, but understanding of creatures and the sounds they make, unknowingly

These words are lingering on a lightless street beneath the tree that holds all of our secrets, there is no place else for them to breathe open

Mementos of months without marking, I am thankful for not keeping track

When anxiety asks to speak to me,
I dig fingernails on thick skin above ink
I place a lip between teeth and
press down slightly

I tuck all of this away in a new home, miles from origin, path drawn like dots connected, it sits quietly on a shelf waiting

This is where I hide love for
If I ever go to look for it
Again

There's this light, really hollow expanse in my chest
and it fills with electric stars, each blinking rapidly.
I'll wear my jumper, loose bottoms and socks
and I am engulfed by a sharp breeze, fleeing in
through our open back door.
I know that smell. It's cold and fluttering and full
of purpose. And it pats my face as I breath it in.
I think how easy it could be, and would have been,
way in the past to believe in Gods and who prove their
power by rylling up the weather.
Blowing in a storm.
All thunderstorms smell the same, wherever you
are. And they each speak in heavy voices, rattling low.
I suppose it's on you to look inside at your grievances
unpaid to them. But I simply love the change.
The power in the sky that strikes and rumbles,
and the waiting, oh the waiting...
As the clouds openly fuse and grind darker, the smell
of the thunder growing thicker and bounding about.
It's like a miracle how fast it happens, how much
energy it feeds to everything.
Time that was the insect looking at us, we are obnoxiously
slow. Is now us looking at the insect, who is amazingly
fast. Until...
There's a moment when that energy reaches its
capacity, the sky squeezing. And you wait
Dddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd
The rain is unleashed. And sound everywhere explodes!
Cause it's heavy and it's coming fast.
Hopping back to the door, I sit just inside its frame
my face stretching with glee, because everything
around me and inside me feels unimportant,
forgotten, under this display.
Small, sitting in the door way, the wind flicking
sprays of water your way. I count in between
the lashes of lightening
One Mississippi
Two Mississippi
Three Mississippi
Four, imagining the maker of these grizzling
static sparks. The ground, the sky, my heart,
pulsing.

I saw him... Ripping the posters of hope to the ground
The bear stuffed. Cardboard box a home he never dreamt of
An abandoned minefield of metal gongs.....still clanging
With life encircled on its rim, clearly in full erosion

One eye had begun to fall, clinging on by a theatrical thread
A small hole had appeared, the left ear on hard times
He looked  sad...his 'Bravo' days departed, kicked like an
Old tin can scattering nailed organs, strewn carelessly

The haphazards hurt the most; those that landed head first
They burrowed into the soft fur, grizzling through
Lack of gripe water to anaesthetise the first cut
Fur ***** were out of stock, cleaned right off the shelves

The posters painted with high definition, torn with sad
Hand shakes. Lined up ******* into fists, like used tissues
Their eye level aim skimmed the parcelled plots and slotted
Into basket cases, breathing in ***** dumpsters before their due date

Shrugging it off didn't work, shouldered earrings...stuck in rutted
Situ for too long. You came between them and the tombs of truth
Caused a nasty virus to accelerate. Baldness stole the soft
Funishings from your limbs in between the stuffing years