izzy

sext:
I often think words cheapen experiences, so shut up and kiss me through your retina display screen.

*

sarah

Your silence streaked the sky
and this time, the chemtrails were true
the birds fell mute, coughing out their songs as air
the river stopped chanting its ages-old gabble
the cars swept unheard through the freeways
and kangaroos bounced off their bonnets like rain

*

izzy

sext:
this is the way two hands fit together, this is the way two become one, this is the original signed copy of the spice girls ‘spice’ album, hand-wrapped and delivered to your door.

*

sarah

I’ve eaten too much pasta again
it’s happening more and more
and I find myself standing in the hallway
stomach distended, hand to my belly
tracing the swollen shape
practicing my beatific smile
and chuckling ‘oh, but you should see me in the mornings!’
I think I can feel a kick!
Ah no, it’s just indigestion
I am the mother of spaghetti
and a spicy lentil sauce
and I am glowing

*

izzy

sext:
I would watch TV for hours with you even if the screen went static.

*

sarah

I know the fear’s real because it slides down the sides of my stomach
not sharp and central, the way anxiety bites me
and I walk with proud purpose, pushing aside dog-walkers
skirting around children with my eyes on high beam
I take down license plates of cars I don’t know
which in this city is all of them, so I take down a lot
I wish bikes had license plates too
instead, I stare down a cyclist and take his dashing exit as a sign
I decide that I can’t be the one to break the news to your mother
whatever that news is
I decide that I will let the police speak to her first, lay the track
and then I will barrel down it with my train whistle words
shooting out steam in the shape of insubstantial apologies
night is falling, of course, and I am perfectly calm
as I jog down the road in search of your face
when it comes, I am facing the wrong way
and it all feels wrong, like I was mean to be the hero
but I missed the memo and turned up at the wrong time
we are silent and panting as I walk you back home

*

izzy

sext:
I’ll tell you you’re cute almost every day. you’ll tell me the dictionary definition of cute is ‘ugly but interesting’. I’ll still tell you you’re cute, even though that’s not exactly what I meant.

*

sarah

In the dark of stale dreams I felt the waters rising
swept around my hips I am mermaided by ocean
watching the moon’s shaking path from the sky to my lap
I am settled in the space between the sea and the storm
feeling coral reefs shatter my cervix and fight their way down
as tiny clear fish come to nibble at my earlobes
I can see myself pressed into their insides, absurdly pink and blooming
and as my skin starts unfurling like seaweed in the spray
I think ‘I have never been so beautiful.’

*

izzy

sext:
due to an internal error somewhere in my computer, I can see two cursors above and below one another, blinking in time, waiting to type the story in parallel and I guess it made me think of you and me.

*

sarah

My fist is soaring, mama
shooting through the sound barrier
winged and dreaming
fierce as your fiery eyes in the streetlights
watch it fly, mama
whistling through the cosmos
this is what it means to be awesome
this is how the victors will be spoiled

*

izzy

sext:
I want to be your tamagotchi. don’t let me be confiscated. put me in your pocket, feed me, love me, clean up after me and feel guilty when I die.

*

sarah

Sing a song of sixpence:
all the sweeter for being unmarketable
in today’s ruthless economy

*

izzy

sext:
I think of you in association with mango sorbet a lot. I find you very succulent and sweet.

*

sarah

This world is all brown and hazy
from the cable-knit cardigans on the living room sofa
to the twice-folded fingers clutching the polished wood pipe
sending smoke to the corners of the close-curtained room
down a slope of wool and polyester to the thin socks on my grandfather’s feet
the grandchildren are gathered before him, hushed as in the presence of the holy
all knees and elbows and big bright eyes
hands clasped, solemn pilgrims, asking: ‘grandpa George, can we see your no toes?’
the kitchen light nudges the plastic rosaries, the travel-size bottle of tap water blessed by the Pope
the parents creak around the tiny kitchen table with Tupperware and 70s travel mugs
the deity nods, his eyes folded in laughter. The children huddle. The socks come off
and two pinkish broad feet ease out to the floor
two balls, two heels, two insteps and ankles
and not a single solitary toe on their strange flattened ends
we squeal in delight, as he chuckles back down
and we all chant together ‘no toes! no toes!’
the past must have been horror – diabetes, gangrene, surgical steel
but this is our sacrament, and we take it together
the giggling children, the creased brown wool old man
staring at no toes with horror and wonder
and calling it love

*

izzy

sext:
if you are the light and I am the dark, there must always be thunderstorms somewhere.

*

sarah

Whoever said that a sneeze is an eighth of an orgasm clearly never had either an orgasm or a sneezing fit.

*

izzy

today I am a pillar.

not of salt
not of strength
just a tall, fat fucking pole –
a vertical line on the horizon

and you can see me.

*

sarah

raise your glasses, boys!
a toast! l’chaim! to life!
to song! to women!
to girls in bikinis on rainy saturdays!
to temple bar waitresses with their hair coming down!
to beauty queens who can’t answer the questions!
to fifteen year olds with ancient eyes!
to our mothers on their wedding nights!
to the girls on the train nibbling their fingers!
to marilyn and katherine and audrey and grace!
to choir girls who close their eyes when they sing!
to figure skaters in outfits that don’t cover their arses!
to hookers with mastectomies two decades old!
to ingénues at music festivals in oversize gumboots!
to visions in samovars floating on steam!
to ladies in burqas and Louis Vuitton boots!
to the women of earth, lads!
long may we love them!

*

izzy

I am going to collect all of the salt in the air using my teeth.

something about the smell of it and you comingling lets me know
the water is a dangerous place

*

sarah

she was born with a pistol in her fist
the doctors were baffled
tests were run, machines whirred away
and came back with question marks,
receipts from Walmart, awkward beeps
we kept it unloaded and she sucked on its muzzle
in place of a dummy, pacified and happy-eyed
as we watched on, horrified
we flinched every time a car backfired
couldn’t bear to hear fireworks
gnawed our knuckles to shreds as she grew up,
kneading the trigger with her sprouting pink fingers
the years passed with sickening speed
until, seventeen, she wandered in from high school
upended the gun on her desk
threaded a daisy into the barrel
and asked why we’d never told her
that she’d been carrying around a vase

*