The Underhill

Pull around you a skin of earth,
green and gold, glowing.

It's life that forces hills and hollows-
push me pull you sun and moon,

and love the kernel cuddled here,
so overused, abused, and yet,

refreshed each day, embraced
in blissful soil.

The Promise

I will build a tomb
of all the biscuits burned,

fresh food spoiled,
all the dishes washed

in luke warm water,
the vaccuming unfinished.

All the 'fat and forty'
matrons with their books

with no light at the end
of their tunnels

will huddle there
in the quiet dark

shivering at the scratch
and scurry of the unseen,

trying to remember
the spells for fire.

Night Dust

As I walk the glistening halls of night
my bones sing of calcification.
Fluid thrums from the caverns
beneath my teeth,

poker machines lolly-gagging tunes
play in the spaces my throat
tries to swallow.

This is a new kind of dark,
where one day melts into another
in a way you just can't be bothered with.

Starfish Fantasy

She thought she could command the seas,
commune with Neptune
and assorted other godlike V.I.Ps.

Her eyes black as dead coral
she lived suspended
in a circlet of floral decorations

not noticing the starfish
who surrounded her were crisp
with dehydration and decay,

unaware that the ocean
moved to the melodies
of the mer-people

and the only sway she held
was in the rock of kelp
as the tide rolled in and away.

Puffed up in her small pool
she crowned herself
Queen of the Starfish

and there was no one
to tell her it wasn't so.

Pathway

She's a hard woman,
a filigree tiger dancing
on the edge of a star.

Hold your tears she says,
till they fill your hands
with an illusion of light.

Hold it up as if
you can see where you're going
and your feet will create
their own path.

Nineteen

She's not so pretty,
in a world where pretty
counts a lot,
maybe that's why
she's a little shitty.

Got the brandy egg
and drug sperm hatchling
with his too big head
and Jesus smile.

Everytime she looks
at his happy-idiot face
her heart squeezes.

He's her crown of thorns,
nest of bones,

again and again
he fishes her from
the cool drowning tide
to stand with him
on his rock in
the warm beating sun.