you saw in that unconscious way
two spirits who had outlived
each other
our karma was gone
(did I hurt you this bad last time?)
our need to dream
together
became less important
than our need to wake up

in this way, I can see you

I never knew what I was capable of

pain, like that of an unborn child
can have no name, no face
and yet it cuts the deepest
loss of all

the wind is too strong
the sun is too bright
the sea is enormous

I can only sing to the earth
each day is new, and each day is my last

it is my life
that dark purple in between the trees
that colour didn’t exist
until I saw me
in a rage so heavy I couldn’t lift
the light in front of my eyes

it is my life
that dark purple bleeds
between my knees, it claims all space
and light

there is no light

I rest here in what has become
my dark and shitty compost
my new life

I hear the mother’s heartbeat
it is the birth space, the lush embrace
the fecund warm breath

I hear the mother’s heartbeat
it is ochre, it is sunset,
it is marigold, desert, Uluru, the red planet

I hear the mother’s heartbeat
the tribal drums, the call to hunt
the prey offering itself, the knowing
the acknowledging, the sacrifice

I hear the mother’s heartbeat
her serenity, her surrender, her dignity,
her grace

I hear the mother’s heartbeat
when her own death is felt
before she dies

I hear the mother’s heartbeat
she is the still point in every night sky
she is the nowhere to go
she is the ceasing fluctuations of mind

she is quiet … she is quiet
she is ever more
she is ever-present

her love is her death
her fragile opening
her tender watering

her love is her body
her home in darkness
her fingers touching the almost in her life

her love is the offering
she offers her best
back to heaven

the pre-born said she would
depart before she arrived

now she is the mother’s heartbeat

it is the mother that holds you and me
she is that background
beat

that pushes us back into life

to think, a longer day
like spring

can signal the death of you and me
because winter has claimed me

and no new shoot rose from my being

There was alcohol and
a lack of adult supervision
and a boy
who wanted something
without asking first.

Did he feel entitled?
Did he see the pleasure
in front of him, like a skirt
riding shorter
as a means of relief
from his own loneliness?

Desire burnt away compassion
and at the expense of all else
he stole the gratification
of then and there.

Did he know in that short moment
his act would imprint a death
an aching loss
of breath, a hatred that would burn
inward and inward
until every cell poisoned itself
and her hair would hang limp
and her legs would bled
the damage.

Did he know she scratched her skin
knowing no beauty
and she hated the violence
like she hated the blood
from her womb.

She never forgave
She never forgot
She told the story
over and over to reference her pain
in this world like a marker on a map

She diminished herself and she forgot what she created.

She forgot, because she would not
have acted so violently
if she’d remembered.

Did she feel entitled?
Did she see the pleasure in front of her?
Like the answer to all her pain?
Her loneliness. The relief of
then and there. The gratification
of her dreams in that instant
burning away compassion.

Did she know in that long moment
her desires would burn a new death
an aching loss as a wedding ring
and a sacred promise fell off his finger
for good. Did she know she ripped
my womb from me? Did she know
the barren world she cast me in to?

Did she know she stole what was most sacred to me,

most fragile…

in marriage

But that hate had reason to return, those dark clouds lay in waiting and the shame brought
no light.

… I wonder why she could not have asked first
Why she could not have consented
to wait …

But she learned from violence
and she dropped those same
stones in the ocean. A tidal wave
is a tidal wave

and she is no better
or worse
that the man who wronged her.

She is oblivious in her
realisation of pleasure

because she has shown
she can do to others
what others have done to her.

he is waiting for my signal
a nerve taps in my ear

he begins
the sound of creation
the sound of death
tons of tones
and tomes

all matter disappears

space, I believed it
was bigger than me
more robust, more substantial

than my existence, it was
an idea that carried
my inner sanctum

I gave it all the gravity
it needed to exist

I gave it everything
and when the tree dropped
it’s apple; my city of eden

the whole universe disappeared

strangers can’t see
the wind whipping
through me
killing the animal
that learnt how to love
and live in these streets