an hour after midnight, a hand on your head grips you out of slumber. a voice you don’t recognise forces a promise into your ear & you start to feel your body dissolving. to be the opposite of material is quite a curious thing – you’ve never known how to be fully here, but being blatantly elsewhere is enough to bring heat to your cheeks. when covers & walls melt into the ground & eyes flutter dazedly is the moment you’re sure of the letter you were meant to write to propriety. suddenly a signature feels a lot more ominous.
putting you on the map is a favour willingly administered. there, huddled to the point of breaking, a person you’ve never met with crescent-hands over a camera lens. it’s easy to be disfiguring, easier to look away.
softly, & perched as still as a bird, is captivity & storage. you are fumbling on your way out, wondering which part connects where. as if you could bring down the curtains of sentimentality that brought you here. being just is a luxury that nobody wants to be burdened with. escapism is the teeth splintered, the clenched jaw. flexing comes involuntarily, you wake up with no recollection of it.
forcing it out while ignoring the other thing. for a moment you might think you were like before, when existence was harder but not aided by any reference. even the lapse in character is fighting to stay present; you’re unsure of which one you’d prefer hesitated.
before you left that room you felt the mildew on the inside of your cheeks & knew you weren’t in for a lovely day. if you could choose between a lovely world & a lovely life you’d die from indecision. not helping is not the same as hurting – as long as you can be as selflessly deluded as you are, as hopeless & naive. no knowing better. no expectations.
rhythm is a tricky thing to maintain & the first thing that anybody notices about you. body moves & sounds – you’re broadcasting & everyone knows it except you. if a frequency is received, do you even care if it was accidental ? if consent is what you’re looking for you might have to travel the world disappointed.
definitively, thirst is a mechanism that drives all artistic endeavour; all the hot & wrong things in the world, every fang in the flesh. you’re marking up the thoughts you had, narcissistic to believe the world deserves to be inflicted. take the world from out of your head & pour it into the rest of the world to alleviate yourself. it’s better than that, it’s making sure you’re empty, making sure you never have to move again.
hooking your train of thought up to a machine & letting it run by itself. that’s why you’re still here, why you choose to stalk light-footed through the undergrowth of the ugly city. it’s in every way a jungle but less advantageous, less known to us. equally as animal.
index & categorise … the more you reject your memory the less it functions under your command. you could like it that way, embrace stiffness & a cool metal table, or the doors that close in on you in an elevator before you’ve decided which floor to jump off of. making the decision for you is the important part – maybe even an element of fun to it, spontaneity, like you could explode at any time, cover your loved ones in spacedust.
love sniffs around & you can – if you’re very good – pretend you don’t notice. a sentimental roaming is bound to leave you in a position that humours you, or the other word that starts like that. hands on a track your fingers covered in soot, another reason to stay complacent, another best moment, another commodified deceit.
please don’t ask me about decadence – i’ve only just started it. when i’m at my most self-indulgent, i like to imagine that oscar wilde & i would have been good friends. maybe i’d pester him into writing a poem for me – just for me, just for me, make it all about me, i’d say, make it lovely, make it devastating.