Primer coat questions

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Primer coat questions

 

My mind is between mice

either breaking their kiwi

fruit skulls, their fuzzy husks

the clicking of supple spines.

That day I was a genocidal killer

and usually I am not white

but today I am because concrete

leaves lime on me and so

does paint. It’s a DIY invasion.

Plugged in, podcast poets

refer to their self or ‘selves’ as if

no-one else can get them

and if I’m being honest I’d say

I am confused too.  Aren’t I just me?

My dog can apparently look with love

the same love I have for him.

I need that now when I think

of my son and how I’m losing him.

Sure, we’ve connected over

mandolin tremors – he can hear a C

when I can only hear fading echoes

together we’ve rued how flies now bite.

Then I remember the song of stroking –

Up, Down Daniel Son, Uuup-dowwwn.

There are big questions for me

in the molars of storm clouds

things like is there enough time

to finish the thing I have started?

Is being part Pinoy making me good

at humidity? Maybe I will finally

meet my mother on her terms

as the world warms her barrio.

Does dark skin make me immune

to cancer?  I paint on, straight

and conservative over taped edges

watching white bore into my fingers

turning those tan eddies into pale whorls

and I worry again about my son and his rat

tail and flat feet and double joints

and anaphylaxis and vague falsetto.

Am I just some cruel tight-faced

master slapping on strips of white?

The world as I remember will suck

the mother tongue from your mouth

put it with all things that have gone.

How many coats are needed before you

can’t see the grain? What will stop

the weather splitting timber to its core?

 

 

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