for simone gelli


what the streetlight is thinking is over her head
her body a tongue depressor on the white line
silence enclosed in silence

is not silent enough

when we realise

she is not dead

nor are we alive

in the moment

until it ends
AM I

equipped to use her body

as a crayon
empty all colour into this colour

this colour is this word
the bitumen not as famous as it is black

unable to get off the ground

despite the collective warmth

of uncounting roadkill prayers to a tyre
I AM

equipped to use her body

as a crayon
do not empty all colour into this colour

this colour is not this word

is not even in this word

as uneven as this word is

I AM prepared to quote it

to avoid where I AM

to not quote where she is

to myself who is not her colour

but who is in this word

where she is ←

gravelpressed
do not empty this word into her colour
her mauve dress of a length
unsubstantiated
too short to be a life

she pulls down what is not there

an aid to skin migration

under hands small enough

to be declared a country
light unsaddled from the moon

is denied its surface to rest
unrehearsed laughter in a backpack

caramelises inertia at a train station
a flattened heart

is kicked about a food court
pleasure is formed in the same way it dissolves
you are in the queue to sign the lease on this situation
the torpedo is being measured to fit the aquarium
stainsustainstainsustainstainsus

tainstainsustainstainsustainstain

sustainstainsustainstainsustain

stainsustainstainsustainstainsus

tainstainsustainstainsustainstain

sustainstainsustainstainsustain

stainsustainstainsustainstainmem

ory
using this word to levitate
her body
a row of teats bloom from her spine

produce a milk curtain of reflective paint

overflows the mould containing her night shadow

enough to squint two pair of male cat’s-eyes in a car
her hair dyed with reflex from an incorrect breeze
sometimes black is too much an absence

light overthrown by the macheted hand

at the switch
no invitation is known to exist

no invitation is known to exist
to exist is no invitation to
when is when

when is when

when is when

when is when
throw an answer down the hole

and wait for the splash
the three of us

still skeletons

when laughter ripples
her head is a beaker

chemical parrots on the rim

crack her thoughts
too green to convince this language into its sentence
there are too many worlds to orbit one insect
we will cancel this trajectory of reason

until her power is restored
we read her eyes as radar

her pupils red blips

in a race to our boundary
she is without shoes

nowhere to walk

lying under a streetlight

to two judges in a car

banging silent gavels

on the dashboard

speeding to zero

with the handbrake on

a teenage body

in the back seat

in the glove box

our weapons to misunderstand
asleep in the wound

before it’s made

she will be asked

why she is here
you notice a bull ant on her toe
the white line is restitching the bitumen
echoes too shallow to be water

are nonetheless for drowning
lipstick on a spoon is for eating
carried to our stomachs

we digest each other
brains pumped by a windmill into space
the two men in the car

are not the two men in the car
two men in a car
an arithmetic safe from allegation