Deliquescent Bodies (Love Parade) I hope for night; it comes; it is here; it comes with rain & river, & the lights are electric. I am offered a drink & the mercury blue neon over the door catches my eye, tears open the retina, imbuing the optic nerve with cold cathode gas, ionising my nervous system to the limit. Breathing carbon dioxide, I metabolize my own body. I am a pillar of ether by the exit door. But I’m not alone. We all matter less than we did before,

Coldly satanic is the phantom moon whose hollow shell is the alien body of a god who hatched and died too early.

Credit: Ahmed Abdul Rahman The Octopus and the Fisherman A lobster paralysed by venom makes a fine meal for the octopus, whose cephalopod beak pierces clean the lobster’s shell, splitting carapace from meat. And still the sea sings with foamy lips. If startled by shark or stingray, the octopus vanishes like magic — a puff of ink, or into coral colours it contorts, bonelessly alien. Still the sea sings with foamy lips. The fisherm

Image, Idol, Dream Abraham prepared a table before me Even as I spoke harshly of the desert’s hot kisses. He moistened my head with oil. “You are safe,” he said. “My people will fight for you.” If I was a fugitive, I was no longer a stranger in his tent. He filled my cup to the brim As if I was a visiting king. I said: “I have found satisfaction in God. I need nothing else.” We sat and ate. He talked of Abel and Seth, Of the riddles of Shem and his book of secrets, Of his own

Confronting the Dead So, descend the steep hill Slowly, go on Go past the lunch cart — Scolding tea, coffee Hotdogs, burgers Fried onions, ketchup — — Succulent dark odours — Smells so foody — Mingling With exhaust of traffic — That they foment in your gut A hunger you didn’t know you had. Go ahead, under The railway bridge, turn right, Allotments to your left — Carrots, beans, raspberries Basil, rosemary, parsley Marigolds,