At first glance

Can you feel this?

I would not let us speak, to say the unnecessary words that serve as a blind, the everday murmurings, till the desperation of time, or this breathing behind closed doors turns our human bodies the usual way.

Words that serve as a blind are like japanese rice paper against a burning flame: they only serve to suffuse this strange passion, a glow against the dark lean-leafed fingers of the night outside. But here is no controlled house fire, no tiny lantern to guide eyes down rigid lines down a page.
Here, I fear to touch your cheek with my finger tips... what scars would I leave? I ache to feel your scalp under my palm, cool skin to warm, but there are flames running up my wrists...I fear hurting you.

But this is only the beginning.

Soon you will beg to be burned, to press your sweat and dreams and anger into my skin so I carry you like a tatoo.

Soon I will press and drag my fingers into the cold recesses of your mind and pull you close, urging you to not leave space for thought or.. words, that serve as a blind, the everyday murmurings, till the desperation of time, or this breathing behind closed doors turns our human bodies the usual way.

Here, see this: the purest ground you will ever lie on, lungs aching from the strain of taking in the smell of rain. Here is the moment before the music starts. Here is the moment when just standing in front of you is almost too much to take. Here is the moment where with absolute care you reach out to touch the ends of my hair with your palm, as if I would break or dissapear if you held too tight, too soon.

Our eyes begin it, before the music does. Digging deep past bone, we look into each other trying to see what brought us here, when did the words pause themselves?...

...I swear if you were to touch my shoulder, here, this knob, this flat blade of skin that moves reflexively under yours, while murmuring hello, welcome, please stay.. if you were to touch my shoulder, I would cling to your skin, nose and mouth buried in the deepest parts of your heart, hopelessly afraid of how you came and then words left the room without a fight.

Where is the dance, the light laughter over cold water in cheap crystal, over roses sad-faced in tiny bud vases, over the stained cloth, and knives and forks... where is the opening of doors, the traces of ice cream on chins, the noticing of your walk-rythm? Where are those silly moments when like napkins we twist to keep each other neat and tidy, tagged with a number memorized by the second afternoon?

You will hurt me. This does not cause any fear, for it must happen.
What causes fear is a thought: you holding me away from you after, and looking and looking-- and not saying a word, for after they left, they refused to come back in.

I beg you, dont. Leave if you must. But do not stay silent, and just look. I will wither and stay creeping about the flush-tank, the curtain rod, in the corner where the a/c doesnt reach, for I will not be able to leave... I will not be free.

Kill me.

Take my heart and bones and gasps in your fingers and run them through like sand out the window. The flowers that will grow will not speak to you, for they are polite neighbours who are interested only in the weather. Take me and let me come in-- I will show you the lonely places of your bed, the old memories of your head that nowadays, sit mumbling outside your door. I will show you the lonely places of me: the warm inside bend of an elbow, a hip-bone left to be bravely alone-- my shoulder will speak poetry to your chest, murmuring, watching the tiny dark roots wave like grass under wind over meadow.

I will know the fear only till you tremble with me, your mouth and eyes a mirror for this surprise-- where is the opening of doors, the traces of ice cream on chins, the noticing of your walk-rythm? But then we will melt, honey over sun-dried silk spun from a worm that sat within the heart of that first apple, and knew what it was to sleep with desire in front of a god. We will melt and surge like an ocean, tasting our salt. Bone to bone, I will watch your face to see if you ever close your eyes-- Please, do not close your eyes.

At some moment, our arms will hold each other, our chins and cheek seeking out the warm space where neck turns to thrumming skin... the words will come like ancient women from some fort, and laugh softly, making music that we will both ignore, concentrating on my breathing, your breathing.

I will tell you of being barefoot in a room filled with home, at age 10. You will tell me what your favourite song is, again. You will mouth the words to me, and walk your fingers over my face and chest.

I would not let us speak, to say the unnecessary words. It is like japanese rice paper against a burning flame: a glow against the dark lean fingers of the night outside. But here is no controlled house fire, no tiny lantern to guide eyes through rigid lines down a page.
Here, I fear to touch your cheek with my finger tips... what scars would I leave? I ache to feel your scalp under my palm, cool skin to warm, but there are flames running up my wrists...I fear hurting you.

But this is only the beginning.


Can you feel this?

A sparse tale: the myth of the beginning of red heads, and their tempers

She sat, frail, pale, folded. Odin stroked his beard, his one eye contemplating a crossword. Only Frigga rose, tight-lipped, and bid her sit at her feet, and undo her blonde tresses.

The Stone comb dragged in and through,
Further and deeper as in her consternation, Frigga realized what this affair could mean.
Loki was a curse at weddings, and now his bastard wolf get: Fenris. Who would not wear a tie, and dribbled rabid hate into the wassail cup.

The Stone comb dragged in and through,
Further and deeper
Its teeth biting down in punishment.
The blood drained from her lips, only to reappear luxuriant, lustrous, till the tips of her hair.

Under the bright moon, the dye set.
She rose, revived, by the water he brought, panting his rage.
The ice has melted on his way back from the world's end.

She gathered her flaming hate around her, and left for an island,
where the clover reminded her of her lover's pug-mark,
before he stretched and entered their cave.

Every full moon she would return bringing the comb, its teeth now dry-dye-darkened.
Once a wolf cub with red fur accompanied her, hackles raised at her feet as he bared his

Teeth.

Frigga, tight-lipped, refused to go down.
Odin stroked his beard, his one eye contemplating the crossword, looking for 4 across: used to chew, times 32.

Scent

I must tell you Achelois, of the thing I have discovered.

Im beginning to understand why we are all drawn to touch, to hold and enter, to build, gasp, and fall apart, only to come touch again.

Im beginning to understand what it is especially about women. Smell. Scent. Perfume.

Fingers down between my thighs a while ago, and while walking to this coldly immaculate place of books, under tree and sky, I lift them to my nostrils and find that Marquez was right about the matter. The unforgettable smell of dried flowers.

Not rot, but that wrinkled knowing fire-glowing smell that tells you here was a living thing, here where there will always be a living thing, for it is here, out of what has lived and come down to its knees midst the softness and dampness of an earth afternoon post-rain, it is out of here that new tendrils will rise, out of here where seeds are caught and gently tendrilled into taller life. There is no substitute for this smell.

Bury your face in the fresh earth, the moist grass. It's touch is warm with the sun, and cool with the knowledge that water runs in secret pools by here, and has before, and will again. In your nose, on your tongue is the promise of all the undefined joy which, except for that first time on the beach-- when you were five, making castles and war cries to the ocean-- can only come again in your life this one time.
It is here that you know the only other thing that will last forever alongside the memory of the ground between the roots of the old tree in the back yard of your grandparents house is this-- her smell of dried flowers, and her touch like leaves that fall with the evening and stay caught up in the embrace of your hair.

And as for women themselves?

Maybe all they...we... I... do, is to seek at times, at times wait, for the one who can sense such a smell from a distance, and who then spends the rest of his or her life chasing endlessly after us for a chance to lift handfuls of deep, richly dull, copper-red dried petals to their nose and stay like that, crouching, living, warm and breathing, forever.

Domestic bliss

The centre of her smelt like cooked warm potatoes.
Each piece juicy, their skin crisp with chilli and the knowledge that they were being stir fried by her sweltering third eye.

This is why he loved her. She reminded him of lunch at 3:00pm.

Tattoo

What I love about them is that you can feel the lines even in the dark. Even while skin’s on skin, you feel them writhe, rise and breathe with you, your silhouette only a background now.

Which is why a tattoo is very like a bite. But different.

Unlike a bite, you require no company. The cigarette, the slender glancing of light where the light shies away from the glass, diving into the amber liquid inside—These are all extras. Props to a much bigger act that never ends, that throbs in every line, seen and unseen.

It’s the act of memory.

Some keep photographs. My mother used to label and date each one, serialize them into tameness, preparing you for the change that age makes, slowly. No gurgling toddler-smiles in a tub immediately followed by profile shots of breasts hidden under bemused layers of cotton. No sudden absences from group photos. Big bold titles, like “GOING AWAY PARTY” or “WEDDING” to warn you of the sweet pain that only change can bring.

Some keep bills. Letters. Underwear. Such have the ability to make you feel silly. And they become …cumbersome. Unless of course you prefer filing: then memory becomes the dusty box in the attic, which sits on top of the shaky cupboard where an old lizard lives, snaking up to nibble blue ink and nestle in red silk.

I sometimes let them see one, or two. Under dim lights, with music playing. There always has to be music playing. A lazily stretched tendon… claw marks. A twined rose and thorn. Sometimes from under a black shoulder strap. Lingering along the bone of my ankle. Blossoming where the slit ends.

And yet they do not come close. Because it is easy to see that I require no company. And also— Here are no decorations for a new bride. No invitations to try.

These are scars.

Which is why a tattoo is very like a bite. But different.

Bites are worn with the complacent smile that accompanies a crowd watching a pregnant woman, or a man celebrating a promotion. Cyclical, and will disappear with time. But like tattoos, they serve as reminders.

When he’s biting down just where that rise on your chest begins, his smile buried painfully into your skin, bone on bone to grip harder, waiting for you to give up… give in. When she sucks at your skin, the tightly stretched skin over the bone of your hip, her need bringing blood to cool your skin, waiting for you to fight… or give in.

The morning greets a blot that could’ve been left by an angry child alone with a wall and a purple crayon. To be hidden with the help of collars and scarves.

But these… these are scars. Every line curving scowling lilting crawling clawing on me is in memory of those I have known… in a biblical sense.

Of course they hurt. But they do not ask for your gasp, your strangled cry of confused pleasure. In Japan & the Polynesian islands, only men received the full elaborate back and chest work. Women were given tiny marks across their chest, arms and feet—even then, the receivers. Like insistent bites from weaning cubs. Now they are less confined, the artists. The only test of strength is silence.

Tiny needles, constant, metallic and into your dermis. The ink must go deep for the memory to remain. Being taken a hundred times by a thoughtful man, intent on leaving a mark.

Care is important. Antiseptic cream… no hot baths for a week. Mum labeling and serializing. We all turn into our parents. We all want to keep something.

These scars dance in darkness and in light. It’s the act of memory every night; violence and child-like fear have the same name:
Need.
To be reminded of when you were broken, and yet survived.

The Sioux tattoo their totem to the chests and backs of young warriors, who have proven their strength in battle.
Walking back under streetlights and light rain, you feel them burn under the fabric. Every demanding mouth and every hotel number stenciled into you. The knob of ash glows bright, reflected in the crack of water on the pavement. Somewhere a wolf howls.
Scars are a memory of victory, loss and pain.

Which is why a tattoo is very alike a bite. But different.