izzy

2.
the black rhinos have barricaded themselves into the top of a supermarket complex
the media reports ‘terrorised shoppers fleeing in fear for their lives’
a steady trickle of people walk slowly out of the supermarket, laden with plastic bags
they keep their eyes to the ground, weeping, and when they have passed the carpark concrete is wet with their tears.

*

sarah

Walking down these cookie cutter streets, ankles dancing on the cobblestones
you looked up, breathless and moaned it’s just like a fairytale
and clutched me to your side like a princess who fit these candy-cake turrets
but I am no toilet-roll topper royalty, love, I am the child of wenches and of bastards
I saw this palace built with slavery and blood under the high-tipped noses of the rich
You cooed at the icing-coloured frontages of houses, and I dared you to lick their faces
to test their sweetness, to taste what the years of grime and piss had made them

*

izzy

woke up, and for the first time, the animals were gone.

hit the streets,
hit the streets like a ton of bricks
hit the streets like a ton,

a mess of feathers, fin and fur
filling the streets and laneways with loud life
run running

1.
bonobos run faster than you’d think.

*

sarah

He stared at her fingernails in rapt fascination. They reminded him exactly in colour, and in some strange roundabout way, in scent, of the coconut ices he had so hated as a child. Sticky memories plastered themselves to the roof of his mouth and he swallowed with a rapidity that he hoped she would take for nerves.

*

izzy

I am the soft thing your hard hands wanted to be when they played at being birds
I am the soft thing your hard hands wanted to hold when they played at being birds
I am the soft thing your hard hands wanted to break when they played at being birds

curled in the cracks raining mud
as if it would always be like water
as if it would never grow hard
as if we would never turn to dust

*

sarah

Elbows deep in sink suds, I thought of you
Big and broad and smelling like a summer morning
Kissing the nape of my neck as I washed
Twining your hands around my hips
I would wear an apron, I thought
You would heft an axe with a certain grace
I felt a scrap of our happiness, for a moment
From another world that briefly brushed my own

*

izzy

hold my hand
stand next to me and look down
we’re safe here

look at the way the sky bends away from the cliff like deeper water

*

sarah

Little lone soldier who’ll fight your way out of the nest that I built for you
After all the gurgling and the cooing and the learning left from right
There will be a time when your job sucks and nobody wants to fuck you
When the bills are due and the phone has just started ringing
When you will idly think what if I just fucking killed myself right now
And mine will be a whole life spent hoping that it stays an idle thought

*

izzy

and I knew at once that I was not magnificent
light breaking its back to crawl through the window
and slide across the sheets to where I lay breathing

*

sarah

If you could bottle the mental energy I expend just opening my eyes every morning, you could power the fucking world and I’m not even joking about that. It’s morning again. It’s always fucking morning. Every fucking day, like clockwork. Anyone who says they don’t enjoy routine is a goddamn liar because nobody ever complains about the sun leaping out of the sea like a surprise party time after time after time. Nobody ever says ‘Look, dude, we’re not surprised. Really, we’re not. You’re nobody’s friend and you’re not invited.’ Everyone’s all ‘Oh my god! The sun rose again!’ Like it’s a big fucking deal! Everyone is a moron.

I slump to the mirror and stare at my face. My skin’s gone to battle stations but it’s going to have to sort its shit out because I do not negotiate with terrorists. My nose has invested in some new blackheads for the season and it won’t listen to me saying that they look shit on it. Hey nose, fuck you. I throw water on my face like they do in the commercials, not because it’s actually refreshing but because these things must become tropes for a reason, so I’m clearly just not doing it properly. I live in hope that I will eventually splash my face right and then some sort of magical caffeine drip will install itself in my skull and I’ll flounce about exclaiming about how beautiful nature is or some shit.

I sit at the counter with a bowl of Weetbix and there isn’t enough milk. There is never enough milk because Weetbix is the most absorbent substance in the goddamn universe. My dog meanders around my feet and stretches out on his fat pink belly and reaches his paws as far away from each other as he can. He looks at me, as if to say ‘Life is long and so am I.’ And then he winks at me, one wink each eye. My dog is very wise. I bet he won a Pulitzer or something in his youth that he isn’t telling me about. He’s also very modest.

*

izzy

1. Assume starting position – hands loosely by your sides, ideally standing. It is possible to complete the action from a sitting or prostrate position, but the level of difficulty is considerably higher.
2. Reach your preferred start arm across your chest. Nestle your hand below your armpit, fingers splayed across the back of your ribcage.
3. Repeat with your other arm, folding it across the top of the first arm.
4. Squeeze.
5. Really get into it.
6. Give it all you’ve got.
7. Be tender.
8. Congratulations! You’ve successfully hugged yourself. Now you no longer need anyone or anything else.

*

sarah

Penelope walks in the streets of the dead
writing postcards in dust to the eyeless colossi
and raking her toes through the vomiting earth
she strings her hair with marble and bronze and bone
because the gods are all dead and the titans have won
and because there is no Zeus to come to her lap
as a goose, or a foal, or a shower of gold
she spreads her legs wide and crowns herself queen
weaves a wreath from the smouldering metals of home
and strides across the reeking, hulking husk of her kingdom

*

izzy

who are you when you fold your hands in your lap and say ‘mm’
who are you under the covers at night when it’s hot or very cold
what is this fever
why are we here
how do you strip yourself back to an essential form of yourself
if you could breathe down your own neck what would you say

*

sarah

I have made a decision and that decision is that I am going to start curating my body
And you are the first featured artist. Look, I don’t need to see your resume, I’m feeling good about your vibes. And look, obviously I’m not super-sure that you’ve got any relevant experience (at all), but look, kid, you’ve got talent, I can feel it, I can smell it (not in a creepy way, oh, okay, let’s be cool now), look, guy, I just, I just feel like I’ve got a really great exhibition space for you.
It’s not super well lit, or, you know, super equipped when it comes to hanging points or, like security guards, but I’ll lock the doors real tight you so you can’t, so your work can’t –
Look I’m just trying to make you famous, okay?

*

izzy

Me: hey, what’s up?
Tree: the sky.
Me: haven’t heard that one before.
Tree: …
(silence.)
Me: no but seriously. how are you?
Tree: I’m fucked mate. I’m the last one standing.
Me: …
Tree: wanna wave at the sky with me?
Me: sure.

*

sarah

I am the revolution fought by the water against the kettle
slow, cruel, bubbling away at the plastic
burning like hate and time
and drunken recriminations over cups of spiked Earl Grey tea

*

izzy

politics is just me refusing to tell you my name
it’s the woman with limp arms being shaken and held by a man in the street
or telling anyone their body is not a sacred thing
that it does not fit in the allocated boxes
politics is not having to smile when a stranger tells you to

*

sarah

help my foot is asleep what if it never wakes up
what if we have to turn off the life support machines
oh my god everyone will cry so much and whisper
‘go towards the light, foot, go towards the angel music’
and then it like shudders and twitches and then the toes turn blue
and everyone holds their breath and then says ‘it’s all over’
and we all bite our lips and hug all the people in the room in turn
and then at the funeral everyone will be like
‘i never knew her foot well enough, i never told it how much it was loved’
and they’ll pile up a bunch of shoes in a funeral cairn as tribute
and then i will spend the rest of my life walking around with a DEAD FOOT on my leg
parents will hurry their children past me and everyone will give me their best pity look
the ‘oh my god I’m so sorry about your foot’ look that we learn to do as adults
and every day ill just stand in the shower and be like, I missed you foot,
and – oh wait, don’t worry, it’s woken up again
false alarm, everyone go home
(I’m keeping the casseroles, though)

*

izzy

when you were a cat you were very tiny
and almost always sad
because you couldn’t jump high enough to be at face level
and all you wanted to do was kiss everyone on the nose

*

sarah

We walk by the river, meandering maddeningly,
fucking up all the straight lines left by the footsteps before us
kicking up the bitumen and bitching about the kids on the banks
kissing over and over, trying to figure out how their mouths fit together
smearing each other with spit and clanking teeth in illiterate drumbeats
you kissed me once only, clicked right in
and love arrived like a thunderclap in my heart

*