of leaves (a Ten-Link)

shrinking möbius strip
you notice the darkness
this evening

dread tightens its grip
in an opiate haze

not sure
about the curtains
a willow in the IV

as if light to the touch
an afterimage of leaves

ignoring the news
we trade eyes and ears
for lungs

turning in
on its own tail
the serpent of

original sin
one drip at a time

downcast spirits
invest in death
on the installment plan

24% APR
the last time you feel rain

with timefall
the chiral network
splits at the seams

Michael O'Brien
Hansha Teki 

Free Space (a Ten-Link)

northern lights forecast
you let the child
paint your toenails

before the windowpane
a golden dance of motes

your love
sixty-two miles
above sea level

we transgress the liminal
beyond the blue halo

cloud covered clay
the astronaut's continental
fingerprints

on a meteorite
on display
an ancient graffito 

finding your skeleton
we build a giraffe

scraping the cirrus
our own private
babel

a transparent mannequin
floats over Idaho

now, a silver phallus
rockets through
free space

Michael O'Brien
Clayton Beach

weltschmerz

The details of the shooting were vague. The coverage seemed focused on reporting that it occurred at a video game tournament. Iʼm not sure why thatʼs important - but itʼs important to some narrative beyond me. Multiple fatalities - the police urged people to stay away. The police created a nifty hashtag. Were they in on the story? Just point me to the bad guys. One of the videogame players got hit by shrapnel - but theyʼre ok. The shooting occurred near St. Johnʼs river.

One year, two months and one third of a day after the shooting a famous director, no one remembers their name, bought the adaptation writes of the shooting. The director was previously famous for using non-actors in the lead roles in a way to make the film seem off. This at first seemed good - that is, a good idea. The sheriff was even quoted as saying - this is good. What the people of St Johnʼs river didnʼt know was that the director was going to take the famous use of non-actors to a whole new level.

The director bought a ouija board and summoned the spirits of the victims of the shooting and cast them in the movie. The victimʼs families found this in very poor taste. Hollywood critics found the idea bad. One critic went as far as saying - ʻthe idea is badʼ. A blogger that lived near a river on the other side of the country wrote: ʻWhat the fuck is this? A fucking casper the ghost reboot? Fuck this shit?ʼ

death camp 2

autumn colour the bowed heads of munch’s figures

houseplant delivery
you fall
into a middle-class terror

distant whistle
between the reddening trees
enemy soldiers prepare a meal

you put sunflower seeds on a cow’s head and tell the child to eat

First cold day of the season. Stroll downstream of the White Cart. The low sun nourishes. A flower lost in a field. Wander the maized suburbs of Newlands. The cold air harsh but good. Home. Take a nap.

Up. Take tea. Take more tea. I watch a horror movie about a magical board game. A car with an uber sticker pulls up outside. A cool looking neighbour jumps into the front seat. The car moves off.

Write up these notes. Edit a blog. Take a bath. My hair still wet. Skip lunch for a halloween cupcake. It was orange - the top was orange.

Morning light. in the last week the light has moved on into Autumn. How to explain this. Soft. Powdered. Baby vision. Nostalgic. Iʼm nearly there. Itʼs early this year. Trees have been turning since mid August. With the scene set up I follow the White Cart water down stream. Seems like a sensible thing to do on a day like this. Pick up some shopping. The Autumn harvest vegetables starting to fill the shelves like familiar friends - corn, squash, sweet potatoes and other roots. I buy some. I put them in an oversized shopping trolley. They seem indifferent towards their fate. Well, they are vegetables. It comes to me - if I was a vegetable Iʼd hope someone would make a burrito out of me. Thinking of burritos, later that day, for the evening meal, I make burritos.

☵

metal flamingo 

starting to collapse

the actor’s head 

and also miniature birds

on weekends and occasional long summer evenings i drive out to the country and practice my hobby

the sewer got given. Not the water but the metal pipes inside and out. I became soil, red clay and took photos of it and also miniature birds.

__________

my cock is a perfect sunset

the world ended today at four thirty after a secret organisation outlawed the word umami
a soft wind rustles a soft patch of grass
a child’s ball rolls down an empty suburban street
that kind of thing

every youtube chef self combusted creating a chain effect that resembled the great fire of rome
nero looses his ear plugs
his sculpted beard melts
his vintage polyester tracksuit and matching air jordans

i scratch myself in a quiet room
i look around to see if anyone saw me do it
i feel self conscious
i put some music on

_________

the fruit runs
head on into a socket
it’s all your fault

promise of sun 
in violence a city comes of age

modern lover
between the road and sky
bigfoot dies

wet bastard 
the sound of his heart
________

the way i say grass

the worst thing about fat people is the way i say grass

i am six foot tall
i have watched a lot of football
i dream of being a golf ball
i stopped worshiping the devil so i could get a good nights rest

my browser is outdated
and all the vacant emojis do is break my heart

my jumper has a whole in the left sleeve
i think it is edgy
i have a gut that i haven’t named yet
my gut is a combination of bad posture and not watching what i eat
i am not pregnant
my gut is hairy and full of shit

it’s ok because i’m quite handsome
and i catch rare large aquatic mammals with my right eye
nice

i am a car with balloon doors
on an honest day i prefer country music to indie lit
i am a gold bar with a willy drawn on it
i am a car with balloon doors

_________

limber fingers
from the glovebox
a lime

__________

the antiquity of spaghettiOs bobbing pansy 

being thought

being thought

sam picks the peppers off his pizza

his eyes fixed low

he doesn’t want anyone to see him doing this

and think why he didn’t just order something without peppers

he becomes aware of the unnaturalness of the position of his head and eyes

he imagines his head going through the table

the table is salmon pink with a teal square in the middle

he raises his head slightly forcing eye contact with the condiments 

he imagines the other tables around the salt and pepper

and the universe around the napkins

he thinks to himself he should have ordered something without peppers 

he finds himself being thought

he starts to eat the pizza quietly

___________

beginnings of metaphysics the back wall covered in moss

__________

summer storm the bullet finds a new diction

__________

distant vomit a boy becomes a hill

__________

water lords

in the underpass

a dragonfly

_________

violet sunset

the farmhouse

as allegory

a soft current of albumen

city of pies

puberty is the onset of spider legs covering your face, bitch

the moon says nothing back

i watch a big fucking yacht appear in the sky and say that is a big fucking yacht

i have nothing to say about the stars

today is national napping day

i buy a frozen pizza

there is a lorikeet in the tree and i have no idea how it survived winter

reciting the name of every british tree followed by ‘you know’ in the voice of tupac 

alder - ‘you know’

you get the idea

__________

insert horror

jellied jowls 

a table white from the light and its tabelness

to be born of age six million miles below salt water

a soft current of albumen

lost dreams of sallow autumn and arctic tundras

wishing to feel another type of cold

wishing towards another god

spineless horned beasts

this dead fish that rattles in lungs

six million years before man

curious as birch that becomes a white table

dread looking back at itself

prodding the egg with black plastic knife

the sports result’s eyes

longing to turn away and back into eggs

banal flickered and wooed

preston two plymouth argyle six

[to insert your own horror turn to page x

to be born a new crimson dandy turn to page y]

___________

not knowing a clock beyond its hands

there are exactly possibly six grains of oats left in the bowl

I ask the spoon about shawland’s arcade

‘cops have really nice colons’

‘why’

‘they eat a lot of porridge’ 

loosing the recipe for stuffed peppers the wind changes direction

‘some men have more than one nipple’

oh. he shows me a picture

the picture is that of a man crying

the point of the picture is that the man is crying

it is sad - it is supposed to be sad

but all i can think about is his bad hair cut

‘nice picture’

quaalude vandal

binary code
the cherry tree
in winter

_____________


quaalude vandal

end of summer sale

a blind owl

the storm

shoots Rome

putting pretty colours in the sky

tracing herodotus

my soul

the border town

now a plural

a swordfish

fresh lilies

becoming thunder

__________

full moon
the love songs
shuffle

half beat behind 
the blackbird

dark side of the sun
walking on an abacus
the moon

a tramp’s doll 
tracing herodotus

__________

mute militia

and then...

becoming a mango

into another green

the roadhouse

a landscape

the cost of spaniels

bronze wave

finding the nightmare
 a north wind

the radio station 
we listened to in college

morning coffee
creating a hippo problem
the drug lord

to some degree 
most humans die

________________

day moon the cow’s breath

_________________

crow moon

a singer

a creaking gate

roasts

opening to blossom

the thunderbird

______________

the cost of spaniels sorrel as itself

_____________

spinning moth

in silence she sees

my fever finds

herself the houseplant

an aztec nightmare

more green

______________

heavy snow

the sound of a man 

who loves his own voice