She is a Meat-Eating Carousel

children love riding them      i am part of the game too

but i’m trying to be a bit more civil      

i have a megalodon jaw      but i only ever touch potato      

we are devices that rotate      like the hands of a clock

its face only as wide as earth      i wonder if i will live long enough     

to survive

the suicide spiral from the springs at the back      

i’ve been trying to find out how to climb the ladder

so we can sit on the mantel together      we could evoke memories

our legs      swinging alms      smoking spirits

the arms of clocks      sirens the inevitable screwing

of the smoke      from the wings of planes      

heavy breathing can shatter domes      

 

i need to outlive the inside      sometimes i’m afraid of sleep

of the blades that will stop in their machine     

the stylus can only span one disc      ostinato when i wake up

to report my dreams at 3 am    

 

i always see her      you took her instead of me      

i am sick of being locked up in wardrobes    

when you say you’ve clicked      to shut me up in purses

what wouldn’t i do for appreciation      i tried to be her

if i spent hours sticking on dark eyelashes      my legs like paralleling

pedipalps      deflecting light      adjusting mirrors

this hall of weddings      i wish i could marry someone i barely knew      

 

but faces behind veils remind me of how children like to play      

and high shoes      i think of the way cowboys stand        

their thumbs dressed in stockings      i have tried to be hard

to look beautiful      but this is a corridor     not even an aisle

and clocks are so distracting     

 

The Surgeon

sometimes i could swear i hear my mom’s voice.

calling my name. i see my small bare feet walking on the pavement contained

in a young full skin. she didn’t laugh

very much. sometimes i think i may be schizophrenic.

 

i see shadows of her when I’m alone, i can smell her skin.  

she is stuck somewhere. i can’t imagine

my mother being soft and telling me i’m pure

enough to die. i’m surprised she liked flowers.

 

there is a type of loneliness you cannot fill

with coitus or money. sometimes i wish i still feared hell.

my child is not like my mother. giving is the opposite of dying.  

there is no solid loss when a mother who could not love you dies.

 

i have nothing to grieve. these flowers are fetishes—black;

with searching stems, caged in vases packed with glittery rocks.

i was not a child for very long. if only i could speak

to you. with my body—the way i am.

 

if only we didn’t have bodies. this is beyond money.

this is beyond the bedrooms we die in.

sometimes mothers become mere matter. less effective

at attunement than paintings. paintings feel

 

with their loudness and softness, lines and shadings.

they take the time to learn how thick the paint dries and in which parts they have knots

and holes. pieces of art stir something softer than any human is capable.

they take hours to show me how there was once a birth—

 

why there was fragmentation. of layers and corners removed by surgeons.

surgeons cut in theatres because it is acceptable to have an undeveloped conscience

under the bright light. they cannot explain to you what they don’t understand

themselves. paintings are the exposition of your phaneron. i can attempt to see

 

what happened to you. i can see you are trying to understand

what happened to me. i have been covered in what you misconstrue

as an example of moral integrity. like a cunningly wrapped

gift. i despise nothing more than gifts. or money. or bodily transactions.

 

A Conversation with Survival

she shuffles under the lamp light. shadows

as thick as hell fire—sickly as the day light

of the moon. the glow of the lamp is rinsed thinner

than the winded leaves that prevent me from looking.

a fan—a blind; made from human fingers—i strip

back their sharp nails to find their eyes.  

these tongues that speak in wet languages—appetites

without food become perverse like my lust roiled with guilt

every time i think of you. the rock bares its past—

how their needles are shaved off finer than the tip

of anything. i have spent hours burning

them on the stove to prevent the carriage of disease.  

i desquamate my ancestry to stay alive

long enough to spell out one word i pray you will learn to read.

 

Annie Blake is an Australian writer, thinker and researcher. She is a wife and mother of five children. Her main interests include psychoanalysis, metaphysics and metacognition. She is currently interested in arthouse writing which explores the surreal nature and symbolic meanings of unconscious material through nocturnal and diurnal dreams and fantasies. Her writing is a dialogue between unconscious material and conscious thoughts and synchronicity. You can visit her on annieblakethegatherer.blogspot.com.au and https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100009445206990.