Tastes That Drown Out Everything

Venus is singing

As she mops the floor

Her voice threading

Through the halls and chambers

Of our disjointed world.

 

I piece together a horse

From fragments

Of paper and fabric

And whisper my secrets

As I plait its tail

To hold it together.

 

You’re just another

Picture on my wall

Cut from a magazine

Because I liked

Your eyes.

 

You watch me like

You see my soul,

Or maybe my mind.

 

At night I return to that life

Which exists now only

In my dreams.

 

None of this is real.

Not now.

 

 

Venus is singing

As I gorge myself

On hateful substances.

On tastes that

Drown out

Everything                              (the woods, the light through the leaves, the crisp cold)

 

I am trapped

In this life.

This spinning globe

That tricks us

Into believing we are

Its centre.

 

 

Momentarily, I pause.

Long enough for it all

To come flooding back.

(the sky shifting to sea seamlessly, toes dipped in rock pools, gloveless fingers turning purple)

But I’ll never let you (see me), cry.