Poetry in a Global Box: United Kingdom

Sophie Robinson

duet in darkness


1 –     violent pulpy mass, pale and silvery lines
          of normal life fading, the suggestive world
          in postwar thirst-o-rama thrall or sting of
          eyes against spine, surround me then – mark me
          badly on the supraorbital bed –


2 –                                              far from
          the passive transparency of parasites
          subacute feelers groping in my abdomen,
          a bitter turn or sensation with several
          points of pressure, I shall pamper your numbness
          with extending motions of my greasy jaundiced
          chest, damp heaviness of discourse weighing up
          our universal meat which glints in flashlight
          amelioration, weeping dialectically.


1 –     & encircling our implicated impairments,
          which we covet, our heritage of lovecraft’s
          abstract ideals on the mantle like a wornout
          star – gas & dust making us nauseous in our
          excess & I long to syringe the disturbed
          whites of your eyes with sugarwater, honey
          running from your nose in excitement you
          turn to me & vomit in a practical way,
          tired of running in this trembling weather,
          tongue ulcerated, rough as a cathedral wall…


2 –     emotionally erect, my night-eyes are
          exhausted, moans seep through in auditory
          fullness, you prostrate on the grass, covered in
          ants & stiff with cervical grief, a bright-yellow
          coldness clinging to everything vertical in
          lieu of anything happening.

© by Sophie Robinson