wept to stone

I come home to reluctant traffic in a city of mist, on the cusp of winter. standing room only on every moving corridor. a little rain cold tile floors and lifeless supermarket flowers in a blue cup on my desk. I'll need to buy some slippers soon.

on the radio you talk about the childhood act we saw together. you know I'm listening and play my favourite song with others from our catalogue of psalms. I look at the tulips: wept to stone, petals long since fallen coiled into themselves, beyond ready for the compost. but I don't want to take them away. the drama of the scene they make's enough to keep them where they are for now. 

in my dreams I'm in our little village, joined by friends I thought I'd lost. we scour our former home, crumbling under the weight of our nostalgia and the ghosts it harbours for the benefit of none. dusty and blurry overcast sun screaming out through every window. up and down the corridors we can't find my old room. the current tenants don't seem to mind or notice the intruders. I start to cry into the carpet. they never look up from their phones.

a momentary testament

how many prophets came before? I read their names and parables scrawled down every wall. the courtyard harbours secret histories. fleeting technicolour chalk on red bricks ready to run with the rain when it comes. the momentary testament contains multitudes:

questions without answers

haikus from beyond the realm of consciousness

impossible numbers

demons screaming for release

flowers and handprints and curses

crucifix mutations

lists of names and medications

butterflies and bastards

Mr Gurns in striped pyjamas

impossible numbers

creeds and haunted omens

once legible dreams

and warnings of the end of days to come. a secret vault unprotected from the elements, exposed only for the oracles in residence on ward. the courtyard becomes some kind of church, our sacred escape from clinical lights and surveillance. I seek refuge from what sense I can draw from the writing on the walls, wishing my heart was open, my mind not bound by parasites and the confines of convention, that I might slip into the prophecy myself. kneeling on the astroturf I touch the walls with both hands. what happened to this mind that once believed? how might it learn to dream again? I bid the prophets reach me through my fingers. please tell me what to do.

running for parasites

taking therapy on my computer: the fairy godmother tells me to listen to my body. when we are low / upset / breaking it is not up to our brain but our body as it does its best to sustain the fuel it has. getting better is many things. when energy depletes we can't force ourselves to be anything more for others: we need the fuel / the drive / the battery to be before we start to move again.

she asks me what made the parasite and why. I want a good life. the parasite does not / has not / will never want this for me. it has strength when I am weak and I am strong when it is frail. both cannot have power / take the throne together. she tells me to think about the science. when we are depleted our brains change and we cannot trust ourselves. the state of our body changes that of the brain. the body tells the brain what we need. when our body is fragile, no doubt our brain will feel the same.

we talk about my brain, which has developed new neural pathways. some have been paved by the parasite. maybe it's time to try rescripting these things. 'when you see someone else running what do you think? how can you stay focused on your own scene?' she asks me to cast the runner, write a reason for their running without bringing up the parasite. expel it from the wings. conjure another scene partner. make this a 'yes and?' create a better neural freeway. we don't all run for parasites.

did you have any dreams?

in the morning the day pours through the cracks under the blinds. if only we could hold the night a little longer. the radio stirs on command to talk about the weather. morning eyes and ‘did you have any dreams?’ I don’t say it feels as though I’m yet to wake up from them.

we take our time to spoil the scene. without words we honour the fragility of whatever we are doing. a slow rise into the day, reluctant, soft and gentle. once the frame has been dismantled we surrender to the in between. I hug you on your doorstep and thank you for your time. you thank me for blessing these halls. another silly goodbye, never using words enough or well. we leave ours ghosts with questions in the wings for us to catch another time.

in waiting for the Louvre

and I start to think of you again

and it's as though you never left

since I found you this has been your home

the silence in the dark

heavy in my head

my favourite ambiguity

bringing blood to boil to blossom

new flowers

your scent

and the sounds of the moments between being different people apart

when we can sit or lie together

coiling limbs like ribbons

letting truth lie sleeping

hesitation

keeping dreams at bay

like the night before Christmas without bells and neon lights

a present we can't open yet

my favourite gift-wrapped marble cryptid

next-in-waiting for the Louvre.

the lady wearing Kafka's cockroach

the lady wearing Kafka’s cockroach is reading Eckhart Tole: the power of the current moment to lead us to nirvana. I tried to read the same book on mum’s orders however many summers ago. she’s lounging on the couch by the courtyard door. arm stretched out along the back for some invisible companion. I say I like her shirt. she says we should be reading him in school. we talk about Camus and what we think of the absurd. have I read The Fall? She says these stories make her think a lot about the cross and martyrdom for show. how can we not debate if anything we do is truly good? she bares her confessions for any passing nurse or consumer, that even in helping others she draws out self gratification. we cannot escape the ego or the cage in which we feed it. she says she couldn’t stand being a narcissist, can’t understand people drawing joy from other people’s pain. slurring shrieks and a door slams down the hall. she’s worked for her fair share of narcissists in her time. there is no way to win. the best you can do is lay low and plan your escape.

a little more chalant

another goodbye

a little more chalant

preempting unasked questions

rearing heads like the undead

monsters in the fridge with which we know not what to do

the spaces between

questions about chemicals

answers needing something more than words

chemicals of mischief

our momentary fidelity 

fluid like the nights washing over what we thought we knew

sensations of the skin

some kind of electricity too sensitive to name

kids under covers

fingertips and favourite songs

a sacred ambiguity

unconcealed by explanation

awaiting diagnosis

you hold my hand in the dark

until the sun

and voices on the radio

to read the news

the leaves

and wake us up again.