salt sore

By | 31 October 2021

the sunlight starts without me
latecomer to the morning sleeping
through alarms chasing
yellow glow well after it has turned
orange
turned blue turned
black

tea steeping into its strongest self
i am trying to change the way i look
in the mirror
my face is squaring
off with my body a race to an end
i didn’t see where it started

i have not been taking photos
of my changing face
because the screen won’t do it justice

angels
show up at my doorstep
they tell me i need to leave

a pilgrimage to the seaside
to find the skyline
watch the light sink
into water
watch the water
start at my feet
the horizon is a false finish

i have not been taking photos
of my changing face
but my camera roll is a catalogue
of melting skies
that looked better in person

skies melting white phosphorous
one bang and two angels
telling me to leave

my dad opens a new jar of jam
and mixes it with a butter knife
so that all trace of stillness
is disappeared
one bang and expansion forever
one bang to start the race

telling me i need to leave
a pilgrimage to the seaside

little windows in the tram
walls filled with sand
otherwise it won’t know
how to stop
once it picks up speed
one bang to start a race

one bang to start
a race with no photos
because i’m too tired in the morning
i forget during the day and
i don’t like the light of the evening
on me
the heaviest part of the body is the chest

i don’t see where it starts
but i know where it will end

draining from where
the weight is stored
little windows in the tram
walls that spill
a secret: this vessel
is not actually that heavy
you can take it anywhere

one race track ballasted by salt and sand

sluggish sun seeping thick into concrete
tannin on a shoreline
everything exploded expansion
forever getting bigger
long shadows like aftertaste

my dad makes jam on toast
and digs right to the bottom of the glass
scooping from its seabed

the sunlight starts without me
because my chest
spends eight hours settling and
i don’t have it in me to pick it back up

i’m glad there’s ballast on the train tracks
spare sets of arms for the sleepers
because the carriages are so heavy

i have not been taking photos
i can’t look back
at beginnings

i wipe my camera lens with my shirt
every time i go to take a picture
because if something can’t be still
at least it will be crisp
burning from melting sky
one bang two angels
i know where it will end
but i’m not allowed to see it
yet

a pilgrimage to the seaside
one bang and expansion forever

i hear the train boom and run
towards the railing
i like when the road shuts
rest my chin on the metal
stand at a false finish

a tower of salt sore
in the landscape
greedy to see how it ends

my eyesight has not gotten better
or worse in six years but i can’t
stop buying new glasses

i am trying to change the way i look
back at the melting sky
without becoming a tower of salt
sugar pink

clouds on my phone screen
jam spread sloppy

i wake up still in deep blue
and watch the corners of my bedroom
take shape a proxy sunrise
like walking the street
on a full moon
and saying it’s sunny out

the sunlight starts without me
and it only stops
for the new moon

my dad puts the jam back in the fridge

the heaviest part of the body is the chest

i can’t think back to where it started but i know
where i want it to end expansion
forever getting bigger becoming something else

twenty per-cent of the body is the chest

yesterday i ran the train tracks fence
closing in ringing to mark the end
of something ringing to mark
a last chance sun setting
metal snapping neck straight
i did not look back

one bang and the shatter
of glass turning into sand

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