I looked back; the city stretched and
pulled me under. I’ve lost my mind
in its jewellery stores and rat-holes,
eyes rolled seasick across its floors.
Angels and murderers ride the trains
mutely and cough when they cover
their mouths, flash their knives,
bare their teeth.
I’ll still walk a broken tunnel
long after I am gone
when the place has been picked clean
and the sun has passed out in her party
dress, the fairs all rolled away and
electric lights dying –
when I’ve made it to the edges
crying and muddy on the banks of the river
where God and the water meet
she’ll still be spread there, the slee
Like a moth I've made pilgrimages
and battered my face
against the rays of stars
to feel their grace,
their language of silence
that my tongue cannot break.
I've found expanses
too far for wings
or fingers to touch.
I've bent and scraped my hands
tearing down the walls
for angels, seen the giant disappear
laughing over the mountain;
stood dumbly at the broken cross
of a light I do not understand.
One day like flies
the words will crawl
and maybe
then I will be
absolved.
Your throat will
be that wet well
where their pills fall
like stone-pits falling
into ink with
ripples and spoils,
the crumbs of moss
rock in a pool,
only to sink
silent and forgotten
to the bottom of
a place where the
air is so dark and thick
it sits in your mouth
like a dank Bible
but offers not a
single word of
comfort.
how can women
house these winter thorns
in their chests
without becoming
beasts? the soft and
heavy black stretch
of wanting, the bluebells
that grew in the warmth
of his sleeping breath, a dark
million miles of silence
how can a woman
bear it? that ache
for light
against wilderness
as he burns and
strikes fires in the dark
the ache to sit and be
warm in his spit and
his glow, his warm
body, his warm mouth
as the wet of the
woods falls quiet
...
I want to give you poems
like jewels and candied peaches,
call you Hans, Darling,
Husband – plant poems
that push, cry, smile
in the dirt of our home.
I want to give you poems
to put a storm in your mouth,
ones that are savage
and golden and cry
like gods on train platforms,
their eyes wet with silence.
I want to give you poems
that can breathe into
yours, the slow green
kisses; our wild palms
touching, smoking,
crushing
at damp silk.
Poems that can make
faces in the bath,
cook your eggs,
be your ruby,
be your dark star,
feathered bellies and
black spots. I want to
write a poem
that can stand before you
proud and bright, make
I like your teeth, two
strips of stars - the haze
of the smile that
found me, crying
in a belly of ivy
with longing, with
hunger, with palpitation.
I like your teeth. They
suit you. The lazy
stretch of speech,
drifting smoke-hearts
in the night air,
the languid prince.
I like your teeth. I want
them in my neck, my
breasts, my heart, drawing
blood and poetry out of
cathedral doors. I want
to go down with you,
through that valley of hands
and skin, the dirty hotels,
beds, deserts,
wherever
your mouth drags me.
To fall down together,
crying out loud
with hands that bite
half-moons
in our backs, hands
that twist teeth
in hair, howl oh
I like you,
I like you
to fall down with
him - his feathered
smiles, busy fingers,
my sore lilac
to breathe fearlessly, cry
fearlessly, kiss
fearlessly
-
to lie down
with the man I
love
Whole Lot Of Nothing by emilygolightly, literature
Literature
Whole Lot Of Nothing
The newspapers are dead
today, blank and proud
there is no news except
love, that which lights
the houses behind our
eyelids, kisses our clothes
in the dryer, pulls
us from our beds like
kings dancing and howling
Wake up lover!
its your ceremony, your
ferocity, your pages
standing empty
love will stand laughing
with yellow hair and
pull your hands
before you, pull the
dirt from your eyes
with a touch as clean
and bright as
paper
.
Nausea fills me,
such tiny waves
that break against
my insides, so
quiet, that old
wet sermon
and I'm wearing
jewels, such big
silly things and they
cast dull shadows
of blue on my skin
like sleeping fishes -
the water lapping,
lapping
and these walls
hate me, these men
hate me, the pages,
papers, parties
but your mother doesn't
hate me, and perhaps
that is enough
for now.