Helen (IIII IIII)

If it was
    longing what do you call it now

Helen (IIII IIII)

how many others glancing
                                         at you

I stood on a puddle of ice
today. I realised inertia scared me I was in a room
, she told me ‘save me a seat’ and veered Across the room he watched


‘Jack, sit here’, he said And I perched with him The
couch wouldn’t fit both of us And our spines
almost touched

And in doing so lost both

because I can walk free
because there are trees, still
because I haven’t slept

Cut as opening, tongue
drip with honey antiseptic
acid. Lancets.
Things tearing themselves shut.
     Picture line heading straight from wrist
over floor to front entrance,
trailing out to street

Helen (IIII III)

Across the room, blue
at the door, flicking up a hood.
I don’t need to say they’re leaving

He’s a karyatid. That’s what I was thinking of, when I was thinking of limping wolves that gnawed off their rotten limbs and kept moving through the ice. He has blood on his lips. I thought so. All that weight he’s pushing up and he doesn’t even show it. I’d snap

Helen (IIII II)

Are you here?
You don’t tell me when you’re gone

try
not being seen, looked-at
unfamiliar

moving past moving past moving past

don’t fucking touch me

my skin’s like paper
sounds like paper
at least

what is the last thing

what is the last thing

what is the last thing you need to hear

—that was the worst thing you could have said

to help being

to know when healing begins, and where

I need to stop taking steps forward

that’s no kind of bravery

what’s bravery
what does bravery change

the next day a tree writhes up through the soil

even its green droop dissapoints
where’s the surprise in this