fish boy

there is something in your eyes

I didn't see until I did

if words would work I'd find the one that this belongs to

though they don't and so I won't

and I am captive to this something

in the waters of the irides

aquamarine

or some other kind of blue

cursed to change a little with the light

the dark

and sensations of your skin (on mine)

fingertips and open lips

your laugh

and other sounds that seas would part for

there is something in your eyes

I think you see it too

if words would work would we will them to our waters?

cast a net into the tank?

are words worth wasting precious time spared for this something and your arms?

I breathe the air between us

you hold my face as though it matters

let me melt into my cotton

rise and fall and melt the same

and I don't know where you came from

but I think I like this fish.

 

to lose my ears

sneaking through forbidden archives in blue light on the plane. I read the texts / our words we trusted time to take. there are curses conjured by the shapes of your name alone. feelings still stir from even the briefest exposure to your pixels. it's a silly kind of poison. your shadow is only ever fingerprints away.

the child in the seat behind me cries on our descent through the clouds. his mother tries to keep him quiet. I hear myself and remember how it felt to lose my ears.

shapes and sounds we teach our children

and I can let the days run over me like water. without stopping to catch a moment / tie it to a page with ink the current is quite capable of taking everything that matters. my pen and paper are my only defenses in the face of forgetting and being forgotten by the spaces between being and not. but sometimes I am too tired. and sometimes the words don't come, or what is / has been remains beyond definition / the scope of any shape or symbol drawn from our lexicon.

words are strings of symbols. we spit them into air and ears and paper in pleas to make sense of a moment / feeling / ourselves. we try to agree about what they mean. but even when they work they are rarely enough. they only matter when we want them to. words are shapes and sounds we teach our children.  feelings are evasive as the clouds. cameras and pens are fickle tools. our minds aren't any better. 

laughter and spit

if I open my eyes to see through the mirror

there are beautiful things in beautiful rooms

when I open my hands to the sky or tomorrow

there is light and dark

dreams open with doors and laughter and spit

then I open my mouth

to taste something new

and remember these songs were never about you

(dream, be, dream again).

floating in the dark

floating on the water off the island in the dark. looking up into the glitter of stars between the gentle leak of city lights I remember I am small and momentary as the ripples passing from my feet and fingers and the algae I can't see. the water is warm and laps over my ears. I look into the night as best I can without my glasses. each dying sun blurs between the mist of artificial counterparts and eyes that fail me in the dark.

I float alone on the mass of movement connecting me to every person on this and every other island on or under water. held between the ocean and another passing night I forget where I am. for a moment I relish my momentary breath of fidelity with our primordial mess. asteroids and waiting rooms and jellyfish and you; new facts and faces every day. how wonderful it is to leave the shore.

too many mirrors

at the bar there are too many mirrors downstairs. every wall is covered in reflection. every shard is dressed in pretty frames that should be housing paintings. the masses stop in passing between bathrooms and another drink as our backstage becomes the epicentre of shared vanities / our apathy / performance. even at our best we can't compare to masterpiece or dream. even at our best can we ever look good enough?

nothing = everything

baby blue and mustard clouds pass under letters stencilled blood red coal and poison green:
nothing
is
real
so
nothing
is
wrong (acrylic on canvas on doorstep of op shop). this truth could be yours for no more than five dollars. I take a photo for later / to remember a glass half full.

of course to flip the coin we find another side. everything is real so everything is wrong. a little like the last line of the chorus from the song. would you live in a hologram with me?