The complete collection
boychild
naked in my arms,
a paradox
a contradiction
of all that we’ve been told.
and before tomorrow
we’ll break the rules again.
and you
boychild
son of all the things
I’ve run away from,
there is sanctity in your difference;
in our gradual shifting,
acclimatisation.
our hearts out-of-sync create
a rhythm;
You are the beat
my heart echoes.
I learn.
November ‘08
a hand on skin
your fingers, freckled
believing this is all there is
and all there needs to be.
strong, straight nail against
here my paleness
here your darkness
believing, knowing
this is all there needs to be
this is all there needs to be
there underneath your wrist,
(connection, life)
my arm
a hair
catches the light;
one jewel
believing, knowing
this is all there is
this is all there needs to be.
October ‘08
finally,
reminder of the past
is not a threat to the future
and allows
the present
peace.
October ‘08
dishes pile
i’m kind of waiting
for reproach
hoping that somehow
if I’m naughty enough
you’ll return to scold
and tuck me into bed,
hair swinging
and maybe
you’ll let me read
you a bedtime story
you are a story
i feel like you are my own,
though I never wished to own nobody
and become concerned
for what
this is teaching
my heart.
September ‘08
bedridden
one’s view
is upwards
i see
the sky,
midwinter blue,
the trees
some bare
(the gums
still green)
against the shining blue
a bird improvises,
i applaud.
from within heat
of sickness
i think -
that if I opened my window
it could almost
smell like summer.
July ‘08
the hurt of losing
never dulls,
even when it’s been so long that you almost thought
you’d never lost.
but on extending a hand
and receiving a slap
you remember.
Not just the loss
but what came before,
the laughter and connection
the companionship
which seemed unbreakable.
recalling the loss
never hurts so much
as recalling what was lost.
June 2008
through filaments
poison-tips of hair
- and there
between your words
and your smile -
nearly caught
but never quite close enough
is the true meaning
of what was.
Transmitted along
the wires that carry
your hot blood
to your hot fingers
and your cold feet,
is a message
what you and I
never have the words for
as we press close together,
never close enough
though so hard it’s painful.
the data carried
by each strain of each muscle
the morse code pulse
of each swollen vein
the sweet distress call
that leaves me hanging
The foreign-language laughter
of a heart in pain.
March ‘08
Coughing up my creativity tonight, I feel pulled between places where my heart lies. Drawn to my music into a world of UTAS, paperwork in the pillions piles in my brain, always the nagging feeling that I’ve forgotten something, some sheet I didn’t sign, some unit code written incorrectly. Caught up in the confusion of conclusive cadences and not understanding why anyone but musical archaeologists would want to know about figured bass, I now and then forget the feeling rising up like the gorge in my throat to overwhelm me, that painfully good feeling that the music gives me, soles of my feet telling the earth, guts rising out through my voice. Coming close to sinking, swamped in someone else’s supposedly definitive music theories, my brain swings wildly the other way. Suddenly reckless I follow my pyrate friend to the pub and laugh and drink and steal his hat, but the music’s not grabbing me. I should be studying. Boy clicks his proverbial tongue but is happy to drink with me. I love him – sometimes it feels stable.
They say the first week is hectic but I’ve been here four weeks now and am in no less of a mess. Seems my enrolment changes every three days, Scummylink are hassling me, new job, new songs, moving in two weeks, and of course I am falling behind. What a time to have made a billion new friends who want to take me out drinking. What a time to have songs pushing at me from noisy potholes in my mind. What bad timing to discover deadly beautiful new bands who want to take me out dancing. I close my eyes and my brain doesn’t know where to look – wait, have I forgotten something again? Where are my keys? I thought I had more money this morning!
Late nights always felt so good; early mornings not so much. Gotta drag myself out of bed. Bad time to be falling in love. As I said, bad time to be loving new music. More hours in the day, kplzthx! The internet is confusing, how to make it my tool but not fall into the traps. Popular opinion on MySpace changes from day to day, sometimes it’s cool and sometimes not. I find it rather like a badly put-together Lego structure. I leave and follow my nose, my eyes get me distracted though and in trouble as bookshops are dangerous places. Painful reminder, photography, bitingly beautiful books. One passion put on hold to follow another dream. So many ideas, so little iMinutes. Finally the opportunities and the intelligence are mine, but I know what I wanna do, what I wanna pay ridiculous fees to be Educated Highly on. I Do know what I wanna do. I DO know what I wanna do. I do? Married to my music, god yes I’m in love, but the last girl was less high-maintenance… Photography bites its lip and goes to sit on the shelf. I buy something that makes me feel cold, a novel on the sale table. Ten bucks for the pleasure of owning someone’s words on paper with a pretty picture on the front. Dangerous places, bookshops. Three days later I get a chance to procrastinate a little by poking into the preliminary pages, and poetry taps me on the shoulder. Fuck. It’s like telling one lover you can’t go to their kick-arse show because someone you like better wants you to pay stupid cash for learning the most boring bits about them. Writing sits next to photography, shouting obscene, inspiring things at me from the corner. More distracting than the hole in my goddamnit I need new socks.
You are the shadow
of what I wrote of you.
My stories
they are plain
but you are the page underneath -
the indented words
and the ink that ran
You make me want to connect the dots
spots of words gone through
turn letters into a picture -
make a thousand from a few.
February ‘08
you are callous
and I am a bit like tissue paper
when it’s wet
when I’m wet
you’ve got forms beyond my experience
shapeshifting and bullshitting,
you’re honest because you believe everything you say
with complete conviction
No, I would not call you a liar;
You’re simply
so stubborn in your belief
of your own words,
that the world bends to your will
it isn’t “simply”
and it took me forever to work that out.
I am precious
and you are a bit like rain
when it’s unforgiving
when I’m underneath it
rain does not lie
and I hate it
for always being right.
January ‘08
