Pteris Cedri

hibernating in fake bodies (hepatica in vodka, or having no truck with brutality (it disagrees with me I played with mercury a lot when I was little, broken thermometers (there is a town in Romania where the sheep are black because of the tire factory and you were going to move there to grow black tulips and youd sent back black and white postcards addressed to our few remaining friends youd invited them down maybe before you got there for black bean soup, sipping lapsang souchong (I met the Queen of Lies yesterday (everything is personal, I was trying to recollect (trivia (like raking black leaves sedimentary, my dear Watson or rectal thermometers (I was trying to recollect a kiss (quoth the Queen of Lies: bodies are never fake (for years I thought she was drunk secretly drunk during that kiss (and in that town they wash the wool before taking it to market (but she was not drinking at the time she had thrown up and washed her mouth I can still taste her (and bodies arent fake, not never, no not never are they, and in that town they take pictures of Gypsies, nude by the black river (the town I live in is dark enough. beauty is easy.)

2012 Pteris Cedri. First published in Shearsman, ed. Tony Frazer.