ONION MARMALADE

I'm sitting here in dreams of flies, prison cells and validation

There's nothing much in new shoes or book stores this week

Not much to talk about anyway

I'm all a bit self, without really giving a shit

A determined mellow marks my heart

and I can't quite pull it sideways enough to care

Seeing things for what they are is an art they say

A swirl of starry night becomes a precision projection on the wall

I can laugh at that now and throw away the gaps in double french seams

like they were made yesterday in some sweaty, shod-shop by hard working folk

It's the carrier bags again and the labels 

that swap themselves when you're not looking

They match one minute and then the next they're off

I was always one for putting cheap shit under expensive brand names

and vice versa, because it's embarrassing as hell in the wrong circles

I remember Jelly bags, we had to have our stuff in carriers inside

wrong labels; wrong bags; wrong life

It's still the same and I can't even do the half lotus

Practice; I've guarded my thighs with my life for the past year

Now I'm opening them again for entirely different reasons

My island is secure, but it's still floating; hunting for bargains I suppose

Just feed it to visitors and happenings

Diluting it's revulsion amongst good friends

I do wonder how you are though

another couple of weeks

and I'll break that habit's back too

Cheap cuts amongst fucked-up dreams and the urge to wake up with a start

every bloody hour - I don't own a ticking clock, I just can't mark the endless hours

I torture myself enough

I'm texting when you ring (every time)

so the button pushing takes me by surprise

and before I know it, I've answered you - again

You're not in my heart anymore (hardened)

but my solar plexus is giving me Hell (brick)

I've got olives again and some other stuff

The jar of onion marmalade glares your contempt at me now

I can't open it let alone eat any of it

Mouthfuls of the rage and sadness in your eyes

the last time you looked at me

Resenting me for letting it spill over

For not having that control

For exposing what it really was underneath

and leaving you with a marrow bone taste

and not a prayer

We are detached from it, me and my brick

And I won't eat it again

SRWB 2010