Stillborn



You tried to stroke me back from the abyss 

scared by the screech of curetted expectation,

of disbelief and surprise at the lack of permanence

                    of our smiles

as the lights turned from green to dead,

to return my lips to the memory of touch closer than skin

cardamom cake with lime

                    you rolled over, 

                    and just like that it was over,

we became Aliced in elephant land.



My epiphany was a sandstone wall 

in a National Park

so smooth the hands held

had no hand holds

the optimism of baby ferns settled in the emptied

gaps of our intentions

juvenile fronds opening to encouragement

from the fissured decay of the escarpment.



The room returned with skidworks 

on ceiling from race around moon, 

half its size from loss of our potential, 

our gifts to each other fractured. 

Street lights strobed 

blind slats for walled zebra patterns

once a painted lady on my back.



You close the curtains on this act

walk me to the door. The silence 

of the souring room becomes a moving carpet

one way to the car.

 






Peeled



The blade cut

continuous spirals,

razored skin

hung

in loose turns,

orange peel on the run,

bounced the length

gasped when its end

was a jag off a navel

to the recycle bin

leaving the raw 

to drip the cry,

sweet miseried demise

leaves flesh 

as wound.