Strange Fat Lip

you didnt leave marks on my neck
like you said you would,

my skin is still soft like you said it was,
my hair is still thin like you said it was,
my eyes are still the same
as they always were

but for some reason

you didn't leave bruises on my legs,
like you said you would.


we spent all night in the kitchen,
you kicking my legs, your height
giving you an advantage over my low knees,

but still there were no bruises
when i woke beside you,

strange because usually i can bruise
by putting one knee on top of the other
and just sleeping,

and sadly you said
you're going home
and you closed your eyes.

strange fat lip,
i woke up with this morning.

It's Not Really Working (I wonder if you know that)

Because I'm restless
and impatient.

Did you ever,
(when you were younger),
did you ever
go with your friends
to the back of the play
ground and let them
bury you in the snow?

Starting with your toes,
creating a wall around your
body,
moving up
to your shoulders
and then around your head,
and finally,
over your head,
so it felt
like you were dead?

It gets dark
in the snow,
it gets warm
in the snow,
it gets calm
inside
the snow bank.

I get restless,
I get impatient,
and yet,
under the snow
it is calm,
and it is warm,
and it is dark,
and it is quiet,
and it is so lonely
under here

but nice,
it is.

You get so restless.
You get so restless but never close
to I under the snow.
You get impatient
but never so impatient
as I.

Nice Legs You Stupid Drunk

i.
I get drunk
off the food these days,
I get drunk.

I eat food and I get wasted OR
I have become wasted.

my body doesn't like the food,
my heart doesn't like the body
(it races and races).

I eat the food and I can't stand up,
I get so drunk.

ii.
all I want to do is eat - no.
all I want to do is eat - no.
I want to not get wasted

(not be wasted,
not get wasted)

off my food,
no more, no more.

iii.
you're losing your mind (you know it),
you're losing your body (you know it),
you have to be careful of your heart,
it doesn't beat right (you know this too),

your heart beats like this (swish, swish),
you heart beats like fists.

your body beats down to the ground
when you get so drunk off the love,
the food.

iv.
before when I ate,
my body used to feel the food,

now it doesn't need it.

My Skin Is So Transparent

how the sun turned into you this morning, love.
turned your skin a colour like the insides of apples browning,
left you warm and sweating slowly.

between the night and the morning,
i find you semi-precious between sheets,
your jagged eyes,
your blood-tipped nose,
your wolves lips,
the scars all over your body
(some disrupting the pattern of
haystack hair so precious,
rolled from bales in all directions,
others on your face creating tracks,
down across your back, the largest one,
deep rooted cuts lined with staple marks -
i can see how you were butchered).

i take for granted how many times a night
you wake to find me sleeping,
and let the moon illuminate my hallowed skin
(your hands all drenched in water,
more proof of your semi-preciousness).

they say love shines in the light like a diamond
so bright the sun makes patterns on the wall.
(your skin is the colour of sun on the walls,
shining through diamonds).