If prose is a house, poetry is a man on fire running quite fast through it.
Anne Carson
You take photos
of the auction, the world’s
straightest Mardi Gras. They
fill the street like
the opposite of rubble. You
have no skin here; you raise
$100 000 and watch the boomers’
eyes burst, who is this
piece of shit? until a guy in aviators
tops you, smirking. It
is a fine property; it used
to be a tram depot; the courtyard
smells of persimmon. Heritage
listed etc. It would’ve made
a wonderful transqueer share-house.
We’d lay out
a huge cuddle-puddle mattress
in the living room, the blinds
open, resplendently.
It’s quiet/ vertical, a ship’s prow
made into a fantasy tavern/ boutique
clothes store, with only
us as proprietors, and we say fuck
your propriety. Vines
drink from the balcony, thirsting
after water troughs left out deliberately
for them. Butcher
paper lines the walls, where
we don’t simply paint over
everything. We
watch the rain in woven
deck chairs, after
the end of the world, resting. Sold
someone says, and the aviator’s
fist pumps. It was
a beautiful poem, wasn’t it?
