Copper Coin Miracles

Petra Whiteley

The animal men, screeching
like a piston in the lashing rain,
are the fast moving train of ghosts
I pull through the tunnel mind night.

The night is screaming hungry now,
emptied, rests in the dazzling breath
of thin fingered drunk winter skeleton
pointing at you, digging deep holes
in the shimmering, ice-shined snow.

I've set her brittle bones free and so
I softly step into the anemic sore light
searching for someone whose eyes flicker
in yellowed postcards, bleached photos,
green and blue shadows, the miasma eyes
of lucid loved heroes' resurrection,

their hanged necks, suffocated blue lips
itch their panicked, agonized blood prints

on my skin, my body and my life.

I juggle shadows and copper coin
miracles for the sake of keeping
you still and amused, pointlessly
happily ever after alone. I want
you to burn my mouth, so I steal
the me you were and the you I was.

Returned to the sender.

We lie. To one another,
over
and over and
over again. Silence
to the end of our familiar days.

(Everything's fine, yes, it is, cup of tea?)

The sundown
settles the uneven
edges of mind, mirror-broken.

I hear you creeping out,
hunting the animal men.

One by one, they die
as I fade
away.

(Right we are, aren't we?)