IX: THE VOIDOID

[Rlzz cutout words pgs 51-31 Codex edition 1996 (mst expensv bk i own)]

 blond beard stubble and glasses with pink

this is what the hole is for

always threw up on gags

lips is working

poison will supply a serum

bent like a fetus except for her erect

brown skin of a torso

and today’s garbage

built on piers that faced

huge creatures circling the rocks

the scaled, gilled necklasses of the oceans

within a pink water bubble

please kill me right across the floor

bite his tongue off

hydrochloric acid if he could

be the person you loved first

like a worm in a heart

lying down in love

that’s death is this being dead

is this the battle between microbes

swaying into pure joy

who i have met

i have met the slitting of time, the breakage of seconds, the slowdown of psychosis, the clockless flight of orgasm, the sick churn of waiting rooms, the decade long blink of a car crash

i have met the hypnosis of objects, the trail of motorways, the dissolution of urges, the bind with paralysing computers, blenders, shoes and watches

i have met the ejaculation of dreams, of the come upon ruptured bodies, the nudity of Princess Di, the arousal by machines, the anxiety of semen, the anxiety of dirt, the anxiety of excitement

i have met the absurdness of gravity, of weight felt as mass, of atomic pulling, of the crisis point of breakage, of the smashing of molecules about my body

i have met drowning, the waves, the countdown to brain death

i have met pain

i have met the vicious old moon

i have met the dark

i have met nightmares of golems and strange creatures from other religions which toss me across the room, of lions and school bullies, of disintegrating teeth and hands, of burning flesh and the lifeless stare of a mother's eyes 

i have met the dying breath of a wounded animal

i have met the look in the eyes of a human with a cancer, a human violated, a human fucked, a human tormented to death

i have met the inside of a body, the ridged bug inside a vagina, the precise temperature of the human system, the wetness of women, the shoulders of men, the complexity of transgenders

i have met the creepy docks of London, the ancient footpaths of Carthage

i have met the dreams of nations, the violence of Tony Blair, the spittle of Iraqi soliders, the fury of war, the smell of my dead company at my feet, the gargled jam of a bullet wound to the neck

i have met the excitement of blood, the joy of antiseptic, the ecstasy of dressing the wounded from the battle of barroom floors, the pleasure of extracting a glass thorn from a bleeding human foot

i have met blindness

i have met ringing in my ears, white noise and the crisis of music

i have met Jean Genet

i have met the unconscious death of my obsessions, the leaking of brutal traumas from my body, the coat of paint left behind

i have met the noise of construction, the shouts of working men, the toil of the body, the heave of muscle against the hidden forces of the universe, the unending vault beyond the limitations of animals, the rush to build, the urge to transport

i have met betrayal, the beep of a heart monitor, the closed eyes of the suddenly close-to-death, the confusion of the suicides

i have met Inferno, have walked with Virgil, have touched the electric cage of Paolo and Francesca and been singed by their fires

i have met airports, car parks, wal marts, night ferries, trains with open windows, the unexpected sight of plants

i have met sickness, nasty sickness

i have met sadness

i have met surgery, the cut of the knife, the saviour of senses

i have met the fear of the future, the indifference to the atrocities of the past

i have met alcohol, valium, morphine, heroin, cocaine, ecstasy, lsd, amphetamines, nicotine

i have met needles

i have met hallucinations

i have met devotion

i have met innocent love

i have met the despair of genitals, the weight of newsreader breasts on sober suits, of judge penises on big gowns

i have met Catholicism and the joy of churches

i have met the indifference of the universe

i have met virtue and he/she is a pig

i have met internet

i have met the pornography

i have met poverty

i have met crime

i have met murder

i have met Hedayat, Cioran and Schopenhauer

i have met Coleridge

I have met pretty much nothing

Li

SYN That cataract of rancid intent OPSIS


Tobler's suicide, at which point she
at last recognised
the Monster on the beach,
an incredibly wide expanse
of near white
looking at the beach is naturally
the closing moments of life


she looked like the Monster
herself
staring out among snakes
needles jails of bones
suffocating as the sole
organic bullet in an otherwise
numb revolver
who
is really
swaying who


the black stairway leading to
the invalid watching Vertigo
poor-diet love
a kind of rat disease
unhappy with America
unhappy with your body
preferring total still
and rotten cold
to mingle with her still young
alpine green colours,
a Swiss body on a Whit Monday


Li, the lurid fleshing among machines
subject of
that cruel Gatsby in every artist
the viscous ego
telling bald claws to go
make marks
might as well have stripped
a body in the road
and glued feathers to
all but the shameful parts:
the hands
the tongue

note to self

the most intelligent thing ever said to me
was
be always unfaithful to your identity

olivia

interloper

morbidly obese

opposable

this is how barflies gouge out your soul over time

respice post te

for heisenberg

you are being silently shredded,
hollowed out,
you are rotting,
your cellular synthesis
frees
the oxidants, the radicals
the Nemeses.

That is time - the poking of holes
into things

as the stars gobble
hydrogen;
we are with them
we all of us have our doom
we all begin to carry
degenerate matter.

when the stasis comes
the final stasis
of all matter
you will be there
everything will
here we are with our beds and plates
and our friendly weapons
and rough dreams
and we know
how the universe feeds
and feeds
and how it will come to rest
and that we will be there

sleep tight, mates.

drop breaks loose from
the mildewed shower head,
new spacetime fizzes
for an undying;
the impact with the enamel
is atrocious
among photons
little droplets
hectic electrons
create billions of new time
that would never have been
and no one
could know
when the next drop
will fall

altered beasts

Crutches belonging to the last of the tronmatic
beasts who once carved their way
this very
way,
birdfoot and goofy, all the power of piston calves
connected to twiggy femurs a popeye leg
they have one somewhere
cast in plaster, stored in Canada
their tenure was short
.75 of a decade
very unsensorial, buttery fluid leaked
from the battery connection, a common fault
roaring like a band of hoovers
they're not to be preserved
melt them
the newer models have gecko-stick
watch it climb
and they walk humanoid -
this is a selling point
that our concerted efforts
should resemble
the beige chaos of nature
at its most vulnerable

they don't transport us
like the broad pyramid bricks lain by
Henry Ford;
they stay where we ought to go
they work
and work
and
make their way to a boiling shed
where they melt and die.
not in a humanoid way
they got that right, at least,
build it, punish it,
but do not allow it to scream.

a love of buildings

the flats of the town
vertical boatwrecks in a
part drained sea
in the mud
and in the road
see
an uncertain load
an uncertain
phone ringing
vibrating
ringing
i pull the veil over you
no answer
i pull a nail out of you
no answer
your flesh is all
buttoned up for winter now
all tucked in

there is a danger in you
an eye of a missing child
did you do this
to me?
i shouldn't miss you
it's easy to pass on,
take your little flag down
pass away


i try not to think
about it
i try to eat
a stale pie
i think there were things in it
this is
the saddest part

something stuck among
the buildings
callused paint
carcasses
irregular fuck scars
imperial now sorely bitten
it was,
obviously,
the end
though we were too daft
to see it
clearly written

there is nothing that is right,
there is
nothing left

Awkward Swallowing

(first printed in Nth Position magazine)

It's not quiet
like they tell you
in movies
it is loud
it is hidden
behind buttons
do you know how
easy they are to
break open
buttons
break-fast juices spilt
out of your mouth
you cupped your
hand gulped
splashed
laughed all at once
spilt apple
on your chin
it dribbled over the
gore between
your fingers
a tiny silk spit strand
landed in your lap
and your spider tongue
sucked it back.
but later
ah, later, it started
so well, but temper
is the blue
in the beige of chaos
oh well
two sweeps of blue
under your eyes
tired
like dark lipstick
on the rims of two
teacups
a tongue moulded in
one of your chinks
you're less angry now -
like chewing it is
impossible to sink
when swallowing;
it IS very loud
and the same shamed
step when a dog barks
and you jump
how silly
just like
after too much love
you did not mean it.
Listen,
a word in your shell-like,
it is like weapons
it eats like planets
it infests like things
screaming like insects
under your skin like.

Gut Flora

First published in A Tale of Three Cities magazine


I've already turned

England into you

I miss it

I wish it never existed,

that there was just a gap

where it rains

and now and then a boat

drumming shod-shad

by ol' dogger bank

old filthy lampost

with filthy flowers

trinkets of crashes

duck taped together

wet

and

windy

just a gap

the watford gap, and nothing

more

I wish I'd been dropped

into the channel from

the vulva of a mute swan.

To think people have been

shot here

the chink still in the plaster

not for a pearl, a petal,

a prick, a rose,

not for a finger of almond

or for this swollen milk,

or for bruised, bitten necks

or brutal conkers

fancy trousers

magic sweets.

I gave you a country

England

I wanted your little wrists

you smell like tree sap

burnt

beer

talking

and crisps

Why should I be ashamed of lovesongs?

Not everything is honking, giblets,

burgers, ha ha ha,

some things

are sad some, disgusting.

Here it is:

The way you sit on barstools

reminds me of Querelle.

I'd take out your eyes

and pickle them with mine

I want to rub caraway

onto your flanks

stop you from screaming

you are younger than me

and

that is how it will always be.

Sarah

Her face is covered
with fine paramecia
she hates certain things
I am sending her typing.

Trilby

Swim

How big is the
lake of human blood
can you float in it?
Is it magnetic?

What a nice image.
But really it would be
a big pond of AIDS
dried up by the sun
in two or three days

Everything is junk
except the sun
and music

Ants & Aphids

I hate my skin
all the cells have
gone dusty and renewed
since I touched you last
I hate science
for making me know

Skin is only good
when it's alive
and you wrap it round
like a coat I would
wrap around you
like an enchilada
you are a bean
a surprise bean
in a mouthful of lettuce
I bit you
I was so happy you
were there
I swallowed
you loved it

Enchilada.

Do Not Eat The Words

Dear People of the Future

Dear people of the future
I am sorry for Sea World and
the Tories and all the cats
who won the Victoria cross

They were not my
ideas

Dear people of the future
I am weird because
I'm dead
for 264 years
I felt just like you
unless you have evolved
in which case
I say it's about 3 feet,
you know it is exactly
1.204638 metres

Dear people of the future
I have been worried about you

Dear people of the future
I am sorry about god
you're better off without him,
I bet your entire society
is mostly porno

Dear people of the future
little ghosts rattle me
and I'm not calm.
The past is less fun than you.

I have no identity
please give one to me.
Thanks.

Violet Trefusism

The Unquiet Grave, Cyril Connolly:

We love only once, for once only are we
perfectly equipped for loving: we may appear to
ourselves to be as much in love at other times -
so does a day in early September,
though it is six hours shorter,
seem as hot as one in June.
And on how that first love affair shapes
itself depends the pattern of our lives.

Untitled No. 256, retitled.

.

We were a couple of unskilled sleepers
imperfectly awake. I am sorry
Victoria, I have tried to become you.
I saw you hung from your halo, holding
your mother’s crucifix as your tongue made

new lovers of all your teeth. I was
thicker tongued when muddied fingers pulped the
wet pages, then you wrote on my wrist the
names of your first lays as I ran blinded
into you; it’s hard to stop a wet mouth from

bleeding, the taste of your pig-iron lip on
my tongue turned the words bitter. We sat in
rain-cars, rubbed candles onto your antique
blue womb and you pulled up your skirt, checked your
maw in the purseflap mirror. A mouth cast

from the vulva of Aphrodite sang
the words from the dead wet letter, marked ‘To
Ophelia’, but given to me on
that frozen night of robed men digging their
silent, acrid tongues into the cores of jade

green apples, tasting for a dirty seed:
‘Here’s hello from what you will become, from your
distended dreams of lithium, here's hello from
 all that you should have done.’

Mutant Moon

I'm opening this zoo. The moon really bothers me.

I like May. I don't know who to thank for it being May,
but,
O Isis, O God/Christ/Buddha/Fuck,
O in the name of Courtney Love, it pleases me.
It's at this time I can erase the memory of
picking up milk bottles which had
little tongues of frozen cream pushing
the cap up towards the sky, like a heliotrope plant
screaming for the sun.

But May has a smell, like leather on the wind,
like a funeral pyre of straw dolls being
burnt in effigy to the
coming of the big burning, the Parisian summer.

The Parisian summer comes like the storms and rain,
the sun burns all the old life,
the rain washes away the
bits and pieces,
the general flotsam of humans.
There is a sort of grazing among people - they are less hungry.
They move around like lizards.

But May is the perfect time,
the perfect time to be 23, the time for the Girls of May;
like Fuschia in Handcuffs, like Velvet in Canelle,
they are improbable children.