lidless

typingbacktothewall
my hand is still burnt
there's a melted cheese smell
bare-knuckle oven-backed
she's not here
cancelled, delayed, protracted
she's removed herself to me
I'm the career criminal
no more big heists
you know you're hurt
the writing's so shit
the poetry doesn't flow
it's selfconscious fucking literary fuck
the gizzms of your deluded second guesses
what's she..?-
It doesn't matter
It doesn't matter
you've done nothing wrong, you're perfect -
let's change
sure, why not
4.5 years down
one testical less
why keep going, we've exhausted all we could right?
I'm just holding, we're just back
only that's not the -
turn off, switch-back
eek out nothing from nothing
december again
december always
if i knew what you, I'll wait
demeaned, displayed
cut open and enamelled
bronzed
remember this shape
that's me
they'll have to use the teeth
most reliable way
i'll already be here
going
going
I would already be
septimus prime arcadian
but anywhere, differential
something to wait for
some dignity in squalor
half-packed - eyes shut
like a pet, like a lidless eye
searching for affection
finding only you

Oberon

there’s scruples in the lessons travailed
hymn of him gone Oberon way with
a fire-brand in his eyes, droving,
seeking only water-tank Golems -
he arches left through tense Lantana
and seeded eucalypt crushes
that’ll be the necessary
‘indolent and capacious’
‘more fuel than last time’
‘only the timid, I love –
that’s the least of the dividers
that mark, there on the trail
between the Holden, rusted
ochre, an dirt-paint bleached
I make a dark circle, walking
the route more times than ants aroused
it always sweeps to the left,
past the first, past the second
fire-trap, scorch tin-foil mark
empty ‘2-minute’ wrappers litter
tagalong patois cities
a dreaming from the time
outlander, starch white, stiff cane
stumble stumble to a carve mark
they met this tree, a bollard to death
boil leather to thicken the gruel,
horse-jerky for the road
bury a buckle for all to find
something tells me the mountain’s
insurmountable
but bitumen eat through trestle-tables
and picnic spots
gilded tractors, primary slick and painted solid
they don’t allow tree-houses anymore
too much pin-stripe action and
aspirational summons
close the parks, fold up the cinder-block castle
‘it’s too Norman, don’t you know’
‘but Battersea is closed’
‘farewell to old Eng –
we’ll not find acacial-fields or Banksia men;
they’re spending cheques at 6am pubs,
scrubbed up for pay-day, the welfare
all allotted, neat, sleeved portions
head up to save money,
facing Mecca for all we know -
isn’t isn’t good no longer
they taught me to ride a bike there
chain-teeth, prop down, revved
in a blue woolen jumper.
They’ll find the body with a teddy-bear -
someone has sown it magenta over-alls,
their buttons match
‘found one’
‘not dark, not like –
‘the rest, no.’

torch-light

Torch light
A boy runs through the space, small, blackened with soot
The torches follow him, searching
Their beams pick up the smoke, curling upwards as the boy disappears
The torch light grows until the beams crisscross the space;
endless, sweeping, building upwards like a fire
Crackling, sirens, wood...