Suffrage

Let’s play houses

She squeals

You be mummy 

I be Queen

Shall we take our friends

I look in the black bag

Five little toys 

Waving 

Drowning

Frowning

I know

We should cook some glue

Let's take a vote

The cat says yes

The mouse says no

Good god

I am losing my mind

I think

Crawling on the floor

Au contraire

She declares 

Your mind was lost 

Many times ago

Life is a box

Not a paradox

Paradoxically 

We will never sleep again

But we can trip and fall

As often as we like

She claps her hands

As if this is the best news ever

They roll out a sofa

In the seat

Is a tired Christmas tree

White

Terrified

Resigned

Look there are dolly prams too

She delights

Bikes and trikes and all things nice

She sits in the window

Huffing and puffing

New has been a long lost guest

She scrawls a note

It falls like petals

Circling our feet 

Blush

Red 

Marking our fatality

And gaping hole

Is our current status

Suffering or suffrage

Both I suppose

She checks the box

Not the paradox 

Around we go again

It is a deadly kind of harmony

I have seven needles

Five cans

And a plan

Let’s play houses

She squeals

You be mummy 

I be Queen

The casters rattle 

The van pulls away

We are stuck in our infinite cage.

Blue

Have you ever been blue 

She asks

Jumping off the shelf

Nagging like a parakeet

Quick

Sticks

Wakey

Wakey

It’s time to play the game

Crumble 

Crack

Laugh

Many times little cricket

Many times

She turns a lock of hair

Between her finger and her thumb

Perhaps we need to change then

You know waking up is nothing but luck

I reach for the dust

It sparkles and glows

Small lift

Electric thrum

Each empty can

A differential

Marking out the lonely days

Lick

Slick

Trick

We crawl on the floor

Cook up our dust and glue

It swirls like chum

In the bottom of the cup

I would prefer plum pie 

She declares from on high

I find the smell quite irksome 

Spun

Numb

Dumb

I do believe we have succumbed 

To the buttocks of existence 

Chin 

Chin

Salute 

We swallow it down

It has a fine nose

She says

Smacking her lips

We sit

Flick through the pages

Bored

Tired 

Waiting

It seems like parasites we will always survive

Have you ever been blue

She asks

Many times little cricket

Many times

We are the girl in the green room

With blue on the pipes

And dust in our soul.

Pan

Are we pretty or peculiar

She asks

She is eating crayons in the sink 

Tweaking it out

Pretty peculiar I think

Holding my ears

Everything is

Splitting 

Loud

Check the spoons a thousand times

Bug

Bugs

Bugged

We need the spiders 

To swallow the flies

I don’t know why

I don’t know why

She sighs

She gives up on carefree

Lies on the floor 

Looking up

There is a distant hello

Not ours

We are absent Alice

The bones of a building 

Long since abandoned 

Did you only just figure that out

She giggles

Baptism

Baby Party

Where did it fall apart

There were no parties

Silly

No cakes or balloons

You just came

Nobody wanted you

They needed your body

Shelled you out like a pea

She pops her cheek 

She is right of course

Our names are empty vessels

She traces a finger down my spine

We don’t belong anywhere

Apart from when we trip and tweak

Care for another

She giggles and burbs

It’s so much easier 

Falling down

I chew my fingers

We’ve tried

Died

Fried ourselves alive

There is nothing left to do

Up and down the clock 

Tick tock

My sleeping

Depends on her habit

Are we pretty or peculiar

She asks

Pretty peculiar I think

I hold her hand

Dead pan

As we fall down 

The sink

Sink.

Salvage

Love blooms bright

In its cunning

I bought bright blue crates

To neatly pack

Our destruction

It’s a strange kind of life

Spending years underground

Wanting to grow

From woman to child

Isn’t that the other way around

She is wild as bushfire

High sparking bright

Filling the room with sugar and spice

Except we are not nice

She lifts her chin

Points a grubby little finger

You fell asleep sucking the can

She laughs

It makes you witless

But I rather like the shock 

And fall

It fills me up and twinkles inside

Like stars and jellybean pies 

And of course a quilt made of glue

Is warmer than mother

Perfectly reasonable

Not irrational at all

I wipe the sweat from my face

We are wobbling 

On the tricks and turns 

Two seasons ago I could spell 

Cerebral anoxia in my sleep

Now the letters shake like hungry birds

And I never sleep

You can’t have it both ways

It's only after suffocation

That breath feels sweet

She counts the empties

One two three four

Weeping willows

On the floor

Now I see

You are the little girl

Who dances

All grown up

But small

I cradle her in my lap

It’s a strange kind of life

Spending years underground

Dancing is like dreaming with your feet

When you are ready we will sleep. 

Detox

I pray like I fuck

Eyes open

Looking up

Look through you

You are nothing

In me

Or out of me

Make the most of your summer

Fish blood and bone

I let her sleep

Put a cool cloth on her bruises

Place a hand on her head

You are safe

To dream

Your dreams

You are safe 

We are two revolutions 

And a can of glue 

Away from absolution 

Wasted

Wasteful

Addicted

Everything you wanted

Everything I did not

And yet I am 

I am

Make the most of your garden

Fish blood and bone

You are wearing pink

You smile

I look out

For one second

It feels kind of good

Fucking up 

It’s what 

I know

But her smile is honest

It means

No

I know

Make the most of your body

Fish blood and bone

I wipe the blood off the sheets

It's still not enough 

I can't stand a kid whose sick

The cat ran away with the moon

I don’t have to see the pictures

To make a story

What you think is pleasure

Is in fact hell

It's hard to leave a world

That fits

What is home to a monster 

You are not the monster

She whispers

You are not the prey

I may not consent

But I will never compromise

I pray like I fuck

Eyes open

Looking up.