Pride

Feeling proud today, so I made this.

A Closet

I have a closet in my room
Against the wall facing the moon.

If you care to stop and turn your head:
In wood grain lies a dead riverbed.

The river ran dry, trying to hide
My quiet skeleton inside.

Iodine

One day I swallowed three lumps of iodine
I choked, struggled to stay afloat

And on the river flowed.

And I swear
Sometimes, when I'm walking
To class, around school, in circles
Fire bites my heels

And everything evaporates
Leaving the salt which lisps
That nothing matters.
And refuses to return me to the earth.

I exhale dark purple smoke
Can't breathe it back in.
Isn't it a thrill to watch the spectacle?
Withdraw your helping hand?

Or am I really that invisible,
Alone with my royal cigarette?

Clench my teeth:
Chain the gates.

then I implode

Sparrows

Three lovely little sparrows

For a moment, on my white balcony.

Soon fly to the roof of pigeons—

Burnt sienna greened and browned with age.

Black and white birds scatter the sky,

Their tails slowly descending.

The mynahs do not tarry here

I know not why.

A groan of thunder, parliament disassembles

And all that’s left: 

The tupai negotiating the barbed wire—

Foot in

Foot out.

Mint Toothpaste

Mint toothpaste tastes softly of haddock

After five minutes on itchy teal sheets.

The taste slowly burns like hemlock

And the spice oils rubbed into your feet

The whirr of the fan as you turn blind

Writing verse by nightlight and sketching in kind.

Burn and Burn

I still don’t understand.

Is your secret sleight of hand?

Let’s see.

Go, burn

and I will sear the leaves

and you will sear the roots

and I will watch from afar 

and you will bathe in the soot

When all’s truth-charred

Or with no regard

Then I’ll leave the ashes to sleep in the sun.

But, you

You are not yet done.

Nothing is complete

Until you raise your leg to crush the ashes

And they kiss your feet.

Anti-Atlas

Nothing depends on the flat feet

That thump the peat—

wrong technique.

Shining eyes like they’re coated with glaze

No-one’s amazed.

But keep your chin raised.

Everything shifts as the world re-aligns:

Eyes on the time.

Not the finish line.

Shining eyes turn from a track plagued with bumps

To feet which did not even try to thump.

You don’t notice the footsteps wandering from the trail.

Your whistle prevails.

Against those who fail.

But turn to the ones who whiz ‘round the track

You look at your stopwatch, you’re taken aback

A new record! And they’re almost your child

Love, affection, your praise is not mild.

They carry the world: soil, air and sea.

I carry nothing.

nothing carries me