Tag: betrayal

The Australian Meat

Could have been lamb
With the rank smell
Of three days out
And lawnmowers, reluctantly choked
Cut to gnurled, embryonic shapes
The diagram, of cross-sectioned bone
With that alien perforation
The enamel still mostly white
Mrs Marsh’s varicose poison blue
Bled out just a little
On the White Christmas rind of fat
A bright pink stamp
Illegible, but with the pellucid
Implication, of a child well behaved
A divided smile
Those big trustful eyes
Still quietly bleating

Silvered & bird’s eye

Sold the dresser where
You daubed my face
For nights out, glittering
Too pretty, you said
Lashes like a girl
The bird’s eye maple
Lifting, on one edge
As if some creature
Of dune and heartwood
Half-slumbered still within
You eat with your elbows
I replied, the way a gull
Fossicks in the dirt
Ignoring gold and sea glass
For lesser morsels
The mirror with
The spreading stain
Of decaying silver
A blemish tiding from the edge
As if the dawn sea froze
Where you jammed
The stems of stolen roses
The wings reflecting three times
Caught the train
In the watchful desert evening
Ninety three dollars for my name
Leaving you behind
In a suddenly, echoing empty room
For a discontented world
The dresser on the rails
Following behind