BLOOD Blood is associated not with true life, but with its pale and ghostly counterpart. Dennis J. McCarthy, ‘The Symbolism of Blood and Sacrifice’ I …spin ..my .red wool in the purificatory rite of ..a ..spider dropping stitches…..onto…..steel altars…My…šurpu..lifts all…kinds….of…..curses and…..bodily…….pains. Let..me..sing..for…you a…red…song…Let…my shedding…..raise….the “strengthless……..dead” in……………supplication that….you….and….they may…confer.…Do…you wish……..to………change your…….answer.…….Pet food……..and…a…….half life…of…millennia,…..or Circe’s………punishment. […]
poetry
An Abolitionist’s Fairytale (extract)
Extract from An Abolitionist’s Fairytale White Master is artist is lover is prophet is dealer is teacher is nurse and butcher. White Master is banker is plantation owner overseer overlord king of kings. White Master is ground sugar is loaf of bread is the bricks and the air we breathe. White Master is Mecca Bingo. […]
3 Poems
A Draft Letter to the Queen Protocol My old mother is desperate to write a thank you letter to the Queen, but she doesn’t know how to do it. She wants to thank the Queen for letting her son (me) live in the Queen’s country. She knows the protocol for many things, because when […]
3 Poems
Porch Plant I sit beneath the hanging flowerpot. Let it drain over my head, losing tiny white stones and soil. Slowly, the ends of my hair curl and begin to bloom, sea-anemone green. Dahlias opening outward from the split ends. This is what they call wellness. Day and night, cross-legged on the wooden porch, […]
3 Poems
Summer Seen (after Sean Hewitt) running barefoot—shades pooling between tree trunks—I avoid almost by instinct moss-laired snails and up-poking nettles and roots to land as if to hopscotch on white lichen splotches swollen on noonlight; you disappear ahead in sunglare my hands fending off the glints the gnats the webs […]
3 Poems
Muslim boy Boy waits until the dinner lady puts fresh sponge cakes out for dessert it’s time Boy finds a prayer mat “Where is Mecca?” Exactly where it was yesterday just a few degrees past SE between the window and the radiator Boy has exactly six minutes until he’s caught again. Boy holds his stomach […]
3 Poems
Soap I cup the bar of soap and pray: happy birthday, happy birthday. The bar is trenchant in my palm, a transcendental weight to calm my terror like a psalm. One lather of White Lotus. Our shield against the virus. Our lance to counter loss. I sense the malice of the stain to drown your […]
3 Poems
Palimpstry i’ve got love trapped in the lines in my hands a labyrinth of previous lives & future ones i see my intuition portrayed in a huge M and the healing powers in several crosses i see my initial hiding from me on top of a line the shape of a whale my lifeline is […]
Girasols
Girasols giraffes are ruminant like bulls I am indebted to my father said giraffes have small yet very thick hearts indebted up to their necks know how to behave steadfastly I ask like girasols grow up I am told about vegetables instead
