at the hotel bar in glasgow
and the thwack of my hands against my thigh creates a ripple, undā studies confirmed once again. electric charge like lightning crashing against an otherwise still lake, its own reflection set ablaze. if skin stretches without remorse does it really leave a mark? ripple, rather, forever encapsulated by pores, epidermis—marble emulating twisted silk. fat wrapped around the bone. it slip knots the brain. and the twisted reflection of my lips on the edge of the glass is like lightning again—curved around the facets, grimacing at god knows what and the sip-to-retreat maneuver blinds me momentarily. slurp down the scotch, become the barrel, curse your fleshy interior, pray rain washes you barren—i think if i could hold myself betwixt thumb, fingertips, and knuckle notch i’d come up with more to say. let the body do the talking while my hand hovers frantic above the page. my body, it seems is not ready to talk about itself. quite opposite, it wishes to shut me out and go rogue, submit to my puddles, scoop my fat and skin into jars and become specimen. every doctor i’ve seen in the past two years has treated me in such a way—bits of a body thrown together pollock-style and threatening combustion. perhaps there’s a bomb lodged inside me. napalm greasing the joints. are they diffusers masked in scrubs? they want to dissolve me. leave me outside in the storm. or i could be dumped on the bank to be collected by the tide. or be flayed and thrown to their dogs. cut up and devoured. eurystomus beasts. i imagine the slurry of my body churning in the undertow, eventually digested by bottom-feeders. only to have the fish cut open later for another’s feast. the protection of swim-bladder and scales will ultimately mean nothing for although i was comfortable there in the gut, with no memory of my body. no echoing voice of my mother telling me my body looks painful. skin red, as if some ungodly force was lashing me. perhaps she thought a god had mistaken me for taffy. what pleasing shapes i could make in the right hands. perhaps she worried that if i grew too abundantly she’d no longer be able to hold me so close.
later, still in scotland, still at the bar
But shrike wings beat wistfully, streams of air careening off them as the wind wicks tears from the corner of my eye— [my waterline]
Left bloodless after my demise, I could see myself become more satisfactory,
(obdurate)
But there’s something sweet about fish bones resting in between the tooth and gum, scavenging for a morsel—there is something saccharine, certainly not savory about fish bones tucking themselves in with slick globs of saliva, their only desire is to be closer to you—to lodge themselves where you forget to brush and entrench themselves in your whispers, although, their war with stomach acid is futile and whispers come from inside the cheek, no matter [unfinished because the bartenders and i started coming up with concoctions and it was glorious]
