Man of Sorrows (Frozen Door 3rd draft)

Among the asylum

of thrusting priests

I am nymph skinned,

bleeding freckles

on the silent tiled floor.

You plead martyrdom
as I chew the door handle.

I lose you on 'A Szerelem Szigetén'

in light dust lacing

but I am a sailor heaving

through indigo oils,

through labourers folded faces,

I press a fingernail

through waxen fruit,

drain the rivers to sand spines.

Man of Sorrows, fish hooked
fingers caught,

I hear your neck crunch

on Salome's pillow.

Alize (2nd draft)

We guzzled
that too-sweet wine
in the sorozo, where fat
men sweat over fruit machines.
I led you through charcoal
wallpaper to the wrong
side of the looking glass,

road signs shrank
like night butterflies
in paper cups, owls
framed a tiny door.

We are lizards basking
in a decollage of glass,
brick and plastic, crows
pecking at a landmine,
we bend teaspoons
down throats
to steal yawns.

Among a shadow puppet
theatre of the grotesque
silhouetted on gables,
we are butter drenched.

I clutch my brown envelope
like a lunchbox,
and leave.

Nest (Sculpture 2nd draft)

Discontent

with folding tissue

paper ducks

you developed a taste

for innards.

The hippopotamus skull

was the beginning,

like Matryoshka dolls

you scoop out layer

after layer, hang

them out to dry

like a butcher's

carcass.

Your obsession

slit my chest open,

ripped my ribcage

like a corset,

filled me.

No matter

that the plaster

bloats the hollows

of my cheeks

like a drown

victim,

clogs my eyes

with pebble tears.

Strung up,

skin shredded,

you hang my core
like a burst plum

dripping from the sky.

Etrog (Picnic 2nd draft)

An ink crow
smudges the mist
of the sattelite orchard,
294 television screens,
the transposed bodies
of men flickering.

I am the heart hunter
plunging through the trees,
prick the pregnant
boughs, burst fruit
flesh with my tongue.

I write my section six
on sliced white bread,
my right to squat
inside you,
but up ten hundred
flights of stairs

where light melts
my shoes, you wrap
yourself tight,
nut skinned.

I settle downto peel.

(2nd draft)

Lemon sun leaks
through the reflection

of a window,

you stroke my palm

with green fingers
as she whispers
in four languages

behind my back.

It is still cheating,

you said, Just because

she is a woman.

I am not above

hitting a woman.

I pressed my idiolect

between paper feathers.

The train rushes
ginger cornfields,
hedgerows dashed
with violet.

On our return, an old

woman sits by the roadside

holding a cardboard box

full of torn paper tickets

and small, yellow-bird

fortunes.

Tell Us Something We Don't Know (3rd draft)

Eyes roll like eggs
in the cutlery drawer,
the coffee stains
on the rug
begin to bleed,
’That looks uncomfortable.’
I gather the eyes
in a pan,
light the gas.
The pupils are pips
to be pulled
with tweezers,
they hum
in a bowl.
A bubble breaks
the surface
of the water,
I cover my mouth
with my hand,
’Pardon you,
I'll leave you to it.’
I dance
with the fireguard
during the wait
but he is overexcitable
and has to be sent
to the cupboard
under the stairs
to calm down.
I smoke a cigarette
to cover the screaming,
the challenge has made
my hands shakein blue lace air.

Vaszary redraft

walking just to walk

the ghost town

and lie beneath the sky

sprawled face

down on tarmac

naked

I wait for frost to lick

me to glass

you are the juggernaut

that blindly swerves

and smashes my ice

shell in the road

you repaint me, guilty,

warm, wet yolk

on your studio floor

always