Tag Archives: stream of consciousness

the birds

it’s only in the dark that the words come, in the lonely space next to my sleeping lover. I read that bukowski had a sweet little bird inside him, begging to get out, and I heard that boys all over the world read his poem and wept. I do not have a bird. I have a nuclear war. it is four in the morning, and the rain has been hammering us all. I am the unreliable narrator. queen of the ashes, of burning paper covered with years and years of indelible ink. I gear up to get sick, and wonder how long the fire will burn for. the birds are stupid creatures. they sing even as it rains. nuclear wars are precious, tenacious, unpredictable, full of warnings and suggestions and promises of destruction. but they only exist in the heads of powerful men, so far. if the atom splits, and the rain drops, then we all die. or perhaps only inside the heads of powerful men. 


I would like the past to stay gift-wrapped. if I breathe hard enough, perhaps it will. I have a guilty curse. I wonder if I should apologise to all those men I burned. I wonder if I will burn any more. I don’t want to. I think my grief has gotten mixed up with the nuclear war. I want that girl to stay gift-wrapped, but I realise she is a part of me now. he stirs upstairs. I hope not with upset. I realise I do have a bird in my heart after all. it lives outside the body, delicate, with precious little wings ripe for the breaking. I sit inside my domestic womb, covered in blankets and cinnamon sugar, and hope that none of this will touch me in the morning. I must remember I am not a film. I must remember I am not a poem. I must remember that I am a human. I drink more water. I can look nuclear war right in the eye. this war belongs only to me. I must remember that I am Hecate. life is not a mythology. 

pore

I peer at all the constituent parts
and touch them pore by pore
feeling for which are more
pleasing to the eye and the mind
I wonder why it
is so unacceptable to be imperfect
in mood or mind or
visual appeal
I wonder what it is like to
be free from your own jagged scrutiny
my face is so covered with labels
I try to peel them off
but they leave trails of glue and whiteness behind
I wonder
is it more of a crime against
my fellow man
to let go or cling on?
and why is it
that no love given ever seems enough?
shapes hang over the questions
that have no answers
and so I dream of what it would be like
to be the honest accurate whole

mirror

I saw her there, in the drunken mirror, reflected in the glass dirtied with smears of black and orange, fingerprints and hairspray trails. I saw her there in her purity, and I marvelled at every inch of her being; a drunken mirror, maybe, a dirty reflection, but one so pure and bright I could not ignore it.

a little woman, she stood there in black, peeling off her layers of wet clothing and laughing unfettered, until they were all laid out to dry. she stood twisted and I marvelled still, at each perfect fold of skin; where her thighs met her buttocks, and led down legs of gold and grey and black, to the gentle lines across her stomach, the creases beneath her ribs worn in from how she sat.

and she did sit, I knew, in the past; but now, she stood, and turned, touched her arms at their angles, one by one. more she touched and more I marvelled, at her skin so golden-bright and smooth, so proud with its pockmarks and scars and stains, bearing such a dreamlike contrast to the streaks of dark hair that danced so lightly on her back as she turned to laugh more, more, more.

I looked and sought her, perhaps only for a second, and saw so much that I had to look away as quickly as I went. what a thing of beauty, what wholeness she emitted in only a moment, I thought, I thought, I thought. I longed to touch her, to reach her, to smell her, perhaps forever, forever and ever more. in the mirror there was only a moment, but I learnt so much I felt tears prickling in the corners of my eyes. I wondered if I dared to look again, what I may see, if those paradises so absolute could possibly remain, of whether perhaps they existed only then, in that light, in that reflection, at those angles?

who is this, I asked myself, that can stand and turn and laugh so readily, so beautifully, so purely and freely, who can posses such vibrancy and gleam in nothing but a moment in a grimy mirror?

I dared, and I saw her again. staring back into my eyes, seeing me. she is. I am. and I soar past my years of hatred and coldness, my denial, my pain and pointless suffering, my self-loathing and denigrating. I am her, with the golden legs and soft stomach and black hair and curved ribs. I am her. I am, I am, I am, and I sink heavy into bed that night elated with the knowledge of the truth;

I am, I am, I am.