the gone
the ghost
the last train home

tonight

I am a graveyard

if I cant dance

so I do and I do 

and I eat 

the night 

with ambivalence and yen 

kissing both cheeks using no words
kin of old queens
kin of queer
kin of sharing
your last cigarette 

in the ask
in the hips
of hello
and the abstract
sense of time
it's nice to meet you
in the grey
ocean of your mouth
and the history
of your skin
in the tide
of your tongue
it's nice to meet you

you multiplied

into your skin 

into the concrete hymn of the bend

it was data

it was tender as the bite

it was an arrow 

it was blood

it was an outline

a calm

circumference that coiled

into the meta

morphosis

swallow the swelled 

sense of rage

the pinch points 

the punch

ease 

the context

through the needle

into the wider 

mouth of us

draw blood

  sign the waiver

eat the wind

the fragrance of jest

the realness of skin

eat life

in its own hardness

unpick the myth

of potency

the sickness

of stars

                                                                                                                                                             and

                                                                                                                                                      then

                                                                                                                                                 that

                                                                                                                                             one

                                                                                                                              exception

I think it was you

that long Friday night

flat out on the platform

puking blood

I had to roll you over

hold your hair

out of the way

now your walking through the station

Monday catching in your throat

like a bookmark

tepid

and tired

 

how the shadow stills falls  

at the same time of day

slanted like the skin

of the margin 

I made

          clean 

                 slate

weight of the knot

and the why

not

cost of a tongue

in a fat blue sky

46
and it's not eloquent
years
your wife
wears her best top
not to  overdress but
to ricochet the expectation
you put £500 quid
behind the bar
so we drink to your time and your
gentle way of being
your sisters in their soothing
irish tongue
sit at the table and talk
about their drive here and the food
I wish
I knew the bones of you
better

the fog 
of a cut out moon

the bloodline

the road

blending with the bend

a square

on a square on a square

roots splitting truth

into roof top hues

border

lines

fists that aren't

really there

Ricardo 

you are made of ink

of hospitals 

of home

your breath is like a fist

made of sleep

you sit like silt

like a border

like a line

deciding where to bend

your pulse

belongs to doctors

to machines

you are made of half the story
your the end of my shift
your my bus ride home
your this thought now
 

the stalled train the anger the rage 
that crawls into your face 
in through the eyes the teeth the feet 
the way your body 
is an instrument you play you play you play 
until the strings are worn the question 
old 
and sliding 
down the perspex 
onto the ragged heap
of rush hour blues that accrued before it
before your minor key spit 
added to the blend
of I wanna get home and all the wanna get homes that came before it

 

broken like the light like the pulse

the walls are walls are walls are walls

incessant how the curtains

still need ironing

after the wash the wash 

the wash they hang 

in the only lick of sun

on the line the line the line

 

  I washed the dishes with fingernails full of poems

  I watched the cut lip sunset turn truck stop pale

  unfolding the crow the crow

  unfolding me

  he said to me that winter is the way you breathe

  I kicked the gravel and his dark

  heart

  and washed the dishes 

  with fingernails 

  full of poems

                like origami

                folded through the I 

                the we

                and why not

                this low tide of slices

                over

                    lapping

                bent and grooved into

                the old

                into the old

                sense of self

                foetal bar code bliss

                illusion and her skin

                illusion and the strong

                wet grip of theory

                like origami

                folded through the I

      scraped into the hue
      whole
      forked split staggered
      into the apex
      into nothing
      neglecting a quiet smile
      kissing all the synonyms
      and antonyms
      as if I mean it
      just in case
      just
      in case
     

  on closing my mouth

  self 

  similarity

  the constant angle

  of an alphabet 

  a coastline 

  of words

  of punctuation

  between the teeth

  marking the omission

 

 

before the thought, and after

 

the day didn't curve

it stayed perfectly still

it stayed easy

between shoreline and affection

the broken lampshade

broke

into pieces

into my hand

light bulb bare

it broke easy

the crack

I'd been tracing for weeks

cracked wider

into the skin

I ask you in callouses
in the callouses of my tongue
looped together
in the blues
in the lowest chord
in flat notes
in tune
I ask you in knots
and scars and smiles
I ask you in islands
in the islands of my tongue
I wait in the shade
and I never explain
I ask you in islands

I hope in the curve

that rarely curves

and the force

is not force at all

it's a slip

of the tongue

a wish for roots

that are wide

and deep

and awkward

I hope in the curve

that rarely curves

I hope in language and how nakedly it breathes 

I wish I 

I 

I 

I

hope in the curve and in the eaves

of sacrifice

I hope

valuing honesty

and the crooked way it spills

all the may

bees

gathered in threads

queued

in pulsing knots

"silhouettes are slip roads" she said
"and bones are bones"
her question ssssss
put skin on the skeleton
old skin
old as the ache
in code in code
ssssss she
split the oak tree
with sawdust on her lips she was just below the surface still
deeper than the root

girl eats the wind
it tastes like Tuesday
it tastes pignut white
she plays rock paper scissor
inside her mouth
dumb tongue versus
dumb tongue
exfoliating madness
with a salty
cucumber scrub
skin smooth as wise
men
saying nothing of the women
she has loved
for what is there to say except
they taste like Tuesday
they taste pignut white
they play rock paper scissor
inside her mouth

Wednesday we
resurfacing
gather into complex needs and envy
the trees
without their ribcage
boneless
and joined
Wednesday we
resurfacing

holding onto the romance of death (or the sentimental margins of loss)

and the moss didn't move
just like the honeysuckle
didn't seem to care
you
beneath the earth
between azaleas and daffodils
every finger
and thumb
covered in dirt
in the blood of dirt
as if the garden had skin
and I had peeled it raw
and ragged
you and
the dust of you
one slow slim lick
of the wound

Peterborough Services

here again like ghosts
I walk half the oval
anticlockwise
holding your weight
between my hands
pushing you through
the winding queue for burgers
between blue neon arrows
waiting for the bolt to slide
VACANT
your body
lifted slowly
and after
I washed your hands the way you
had washed mine
was and is
the was and is I walk
half the oval
anticlockwise
remembering your weight
between my hands
that old wheelchair now
returned the things
you have to give back
the places
that remind you