who's afraid of primordial soup?

I cut myself shaving by mistake in the shower. diluted blood paints the water running down the plughole; weak reds that could be pinks. this used to happen every morning between the scales and brushing teeth. cuts assume familiar spots under the chin along my jaw. water stings the openings, passing down my neck into the sink. I dab them softly with a towel until they're less inclined to bleed and looking more like freckles. smile with teeth and count the red marks in the mirror. I think about the burning kids and want to smash the glass. curse myself for caring enough to even bother shaving. people only notice if they really want to see you.

blood dries on the towel and runs through pipes into the sea. everything returns: laughing and bleeding into the same queue for the flames. only ever somewhere between clay and the ashes. what are we still waiting for?

Goliath etc.

at the window waiting for the cat to come inside. I spy him by the driveway; frozen and staring at the convict-chipped stones of the garden wall. I wonder what he's thinking, if he ever thinks at all. there's a sadness to his stillness by the flowers and the bees. a sombre statue til the front door opens. bells and leaps up steps into the warmth. a silver dish of breakfast waiting on the kitchen floor.

the fruit bowl overflows. we think of making lemonade instead of progress. surrender what we shouldn't with excuses from the news. there are glimpses of clear between clouds. birds chirping through chatter and Uma Thurman's daughter. we talk about our therapists and compare back catalogues of dreams. sun reaches through gaps between branches to light your eyes. your laugh feels like a hug. maybe we’re learning each other again. half asleep on the precipice of peace before tomorrow's hammer.

I scrunch the paper for a fire and prolong finding my new home. we’re running out of matches. mum talks about the man of the shroud; carbon scans and photos on her phone. I think about Goliath and where we'd be if he had won. the actors on the TV cry through stories I won't follow. 'you really might want to think before you speak.' I fold my brother's laundry and keep hiding from my own.

paper pedestal

I imbue too much importance to the thoughts in spite of what I see and know about the world. fragile as forever, years of anger cast into a matchstick frame. the limb man stands to make the shadow of a statue he admires. we balance on a pedestal of headlines folded footsteps from the fire. carbon crackles into clouds. I listen to the psalms I wait too long for. sync my pulse up to the rhythm and shower in their anguish and confessions. all the while we ghost the mirror and read the numbers on the floor.

on the floor to make new shapes. I fold myself closed and open again; down on my back in obsessive compulsions, resculpting the flesh for a god I could never please. the ache wells, a familiar grip around my belly, scrunching smaller into a fist. caught between the unnamable; never being enough and a perennial unwillingness to relinquish the shred of potential I saw in a dream. I venerate the vision hanging on the walls of my sockets like a crucifix. repeat the rituals with toothpaste in my spit. 

Virgin in the sunroom

I cut the orange open: it bleeds a different colour though it all still tastes the same

six years of taking pills to fix my chemical imbalance

at best we water down the curse, dress the parasite in silks and sunny colours

when did I last fly a kite?

I want to be held

conceal my limbs in armour

or someone like you

I want to be well

to not need to make myself so small

or livestream holocausts to feel my pulse

I want a different body

from the boy movie or magazine

to be met at a different time in my life

saint Sebastian or someone on the sidewalk

we wrap our scars in bandages and each other’s arms

and talk about anything but tomorrow

I want to breathe alone

and live beyond my phone

when the nightmare ends

to start again

a new world order

with kids at school and not on fire

their paintings cover mirrors

less bombs and more thinking of you in the confectionary aisle

I want too much

and still pray for more

half asleep and knowing just how little I know

I want to play Virgin in the sunroom tonight. 

the museum of modern love

I close tabs for an email from a friend: a book review for a novel she bought on her trip to my hometown. we were in the store and she said she wanted to read something from the island. I recommended a book I hadn't read by an author I've only heard about through other people. something about an artist I don't know much about. on the phone she tells me the book has taken her to New York rather than the Tasmanian wilderness. she had wanted to read about the place I grew up - a confession she makes at the start of the review. I guess I let her down on that front, though I care less about my fault in reading where the novel took her. it seems she passed through far more important places than a closer understanding of the stolen land I learnt to walk on.

she writes and asks me to be still and listen. the I am challenged by the invitation. the review opens a generous glimpse of the tapestry she's weaving upstairs in the current moment. there's an openness to her voice that rarely carries on the words of someone so wise. blinds left undrawn, sincere without the wistful hope of naivety. she finds reflections of herself in revelations from the trials of the mystic followed in the book. a desire for intimacy with a heart closed by an epoch of dishes and headlines too pressing for hope. prophets see the stars: every good thing ends and all we have is one foot in the stream. she casts a fresh sheet of glass from these fragments of herself. tears and more tomorrow. I see myself through her new window and I think she sees me too. 

John

death of a family friend: third husband of my father's ex employer. a sudden stroke at eighty something. he would catch us fish from the shore and make me feel useful in the kitchen while he cooked us dinner. invested in my interests and whatever I brought to the table. I remember his lessons on red wine etiquette before hitting double digits in the village. my brother and I caught his stomach bug on a week at their place with the backyard pool on the coast. I was sick by the car and he patted my back at the airport drive-by drop-off. he liked to read and knew me better than my grandparents. I'll miss his hugs and funeral. the clock ticks over and we roll on as we were without quite knowing why.

into solstice sun

away for a moment. we wake before we would have liked to swim into the sunrise of the shortest day. freezing sea as still as glass. I slip under and feel the burning through the skin into my bones. on the surface hues of blue give way to pastel pinks and yellows. morning clouds and a slight chance of hypothermia. I retreat into the refuge of my own arms and a towel.

I peal the paper from the ceiling of the bedroom of my youth. pages torn from a book I never read flake onto the bed; reluctant leaves, late autumn breeze. nine years of mould and long forgotten cracks left by the weather or the weight of possums in the attic now exposed. I catch a glimpse of my former hopes and wistful disillusionment in the pathetic fractures of the paint. there are bruises behind every postcard and other paper relic cast from former lives upon the wall. this whole room needs an exorcism. am I ready to grow up?

the leader of the free world plays with world war three for fun. I read the news as it comes and watch us bomb our way to hell. you can tune in when you want. there's always something else. what world will I wake to when I get up in the morning?