it tastes sweet.

"We're travellers, you and I," he wrote.

2AM.

Another cigarette out on the back doorstep in the middle on a freezing Melbourne evening. In this chill, it becomes difficult to tell where smoke ends and condensation begins. I shiver, wrap my free arm around myself a little tighter. The only light on in the house is my bedroom's, cutting through the darkness with a weak glow; the world is still and waiting for something - the sound of your voice riddled with interference, but still there, maybe. A notebook filled with scribble and half-thoughts, fragmented poetics. The perfect silence of the night begs to be cut through. I am patient and I wait for you to take me in.

spin spin sugar.

Old memories come out to play on the stereo, and for a brief, fleeting six minutes my eyes are closed and - do you remember dancing to this? I'm in Luke's loungeroom again, and for a small moment in time, everything is okay.

and it's okay - you give me everything i need.

"Meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeelbaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahn! I feel you!"

—Karl Hyde, 13/06/10

ninety-three years on.

Wrapped in the chill and silence of June, I find myself aching for long stretches of sunlit concrete and hourless, blurry days and nights. Today is for rain-streaked streets and my too-slim, miserable reflection in glass buildings watching me back from unrelentless grey. I always seem to fold back into myself during the winter.

--

your airplanes
Rachel McKibbens

I.

over breakfast,
my father asks what you see in me.

I bite the inside of my cheek,

shove a forkful of pancakes into my mouth,
notice the salt shaker eyeing my wounds.

II.

you launch "I love yous"
from a Brooklyn fire escape.

they travel 3,000 postcard miles
and collapse into my ear, exhausted.

I pinch their noses,
breathe new life into their lungs,
fold them into airplanes,

send them back to you
and wait.

III.

there isn't a building
taller than two stories
here in Orange County.
not a single fire escape.

no point in jumping.
the worst that could happen
is a broken leg or heart.

this is why the sad kids get
so goddamn creative around here.

the mayor's son rigged his noose
to raise with the garage door
when the Mercedes came home.

a nine-year old leapt into the lion's cage
at Prentice Park Zoo after
her dog was hit by a car.

IV.

on our wedding day,
when I tell you "I do,"

it's because I do.

it's because you understand
how ten-thousand dollar apologies
still keep fathers worthless,

it's because my ribcage expands
every time I think of you,

it's for all the things
you see in me

and pretend
not to notice.