Hello

      Dream State Covers tight as clingfilm. Tell them you fell headfirst, steadied yourself, sucked out what was left in your throat, coughed that creamy polyethylene onto the pillow. Eyeballs infused with miniature blue irises plunge into the well....

      Widows Walk Evenings she puts on her second-best hat skewered with a tortoise shell pin, buttons up her heart in a mauve mohair coat sallies forth to pick a bone with the moon. On the red-leaded step she scans the stars imagines them white sparks...

      You Call This Summer More like a chicken bone tossed to a pigeon. More like a half-portion of peanut butter slicked in the jar we never throw out. I pedal through birds in Tommy Thompson, all strong enough to fly south soon – if I check the water...

      My Heaven is Inside My Body My heaven is inside my body, my heaven is a great many, like stars in the night sky, with silver towers, huge edifices that look like sapphires, golden palaces, gardens of crystal. My body is bigger than the universe,...

      Play Partner It is never easy, spotting the red flags, amidst the intense joy, and very high highs of exploring a new partner. A mind is filled with thoughts. Like a seesaw, it tips Left, right, left, right Stay, go, stay, go. Go. You know what...

      Wile E. Coyote Pauses for Thought All these unthinking technocratic years shooting myself from giant rubber bands and pawing vitamins –the kind that build your limbs into flexible hillsides– down my ravenous throat and here I still am, a blurring...

    Invitation The flamingoes are waiting, poised pink rippling across the water. Bubbles rise around my feet disturbing frogs and fish. I balance on one leg to show that I am good enough to be a bird. Hands on hips, I flex my elbows, lower my shoulders,...

      Ascent of the Blessed After Hieronymus Bosch Hovering a hundred feet over an ambulance in the starless dark, they congregate. Below: a machine frantic to restart my heart. My silver cord stretches, doesn’t quite snap. I look down on the mad...

      In a Time of Crisis Not all the small things you can do can save the world. Never say “It couldn’t happen here!” It could. Put on your best face for the future and take heart. Rescue those you can and leave the rest – the boat has only so much...

      Flying to Reykjavik I've been here hours. Sharing air with a factory of lawyers, a dead-eyed clerk, a bored, squinting judge and you. Stacks of files, a new party wall, divide us. In this windowless box excess words are trying to escape. They...

      choice (n). 1. a lack of certainty 2. a presence of freedom 3. a privilege of possibility choose (v). 1. to sacrifice 2. to forfeit ignorance 3. to exercise discernment 4. to implicitly accept responsibility chosen (adj). 1. the act, or art, of...

      Insomnia Night shakes hurt the most. Firm hands strangle the life out of sedate songs. You’re awake breathing the curse of noise, as dark sniggers. The hours clang, trees thump the ground, damp air sharpens knives. Prickly reminders have lodged in...

      Moderately / A Lot / Extremely I have saved up so many things that they get in the way:  the smell of your temple, just above the ear; the grip of your hand for fear it will be the last. Your laugh and every cumulative ambulance clang jam-stuffed...

      Goat Keeper There is a hill with a house, goats graze in a green pasture. They are my responsibility When the righteous priest comes with his red ribbon I will run him through with a pitchfork, pin him to a tree before he touches one hair on one...

      I am recovering from the crying I did yesterday I thought about it downstairs felt the low hum of a migraine beginning to squeal I prefer falling down the stairs I prefer watching a knife drop from my hand and land in my nail bed I prefer taking...

      Bay of Pigs Our mums pushed us on the swings and talked about the end of the world. Russians, they said, nuclear bombs, radioactive. What if? You never knew what might happen, bloody Commies, iron curtain, on telly. Ssh. The children. My mum...