‘a moment’s unrecoverable banishment of self’—Evelyn Lau
In whatever era this finds you—I am out of my depth. The more
I say I write poetry, the less I express it, and so in a container
of salted water, I saturate my pages for tomorrow’s absence.
Inside the mist of living without death there is the accumulation
of living with death and the lure of drama, barbed assumptions,
the only way it goes—is drama. Natural versus man-made injuries—
as if tragedy allows for transferable roles and the glorious thrill
of gorging on the banquet that is your own body. No one has ever
wanted to consume me like this, and one must be composed
when both guest and host. Heritage-listed façades in the foreground,
assemblies in the background. The common areas of the complex,
in order of appearance—the entrance, the hallways, several
outdoor-facing windows, and the laundry. Letters to outline
measures of permitted distances—as if adoration could be restricted.
My account allows for building poems, not a house. Wipe a finger
along the dusty plaster of a wall and rub the powder over your eyelids.
If possible, leave your home during allocated hours, blink
as a reminder you still own secrets and must harness the gift to lie.
A circulated memo updates the limits of imagination before it falls
into predictability or magical thinking. I am cushioned in pursuing
experiences from written scripts as you ache in a pre-arranged room
for a statement to be recorded after the accident—your dry mouth
craving for slippage. The fever of this scene heats—like love, endless
love, rumoured to be as expected as flesh. Since there were no physical
injuries after the collision you must form and sustain a narrative,
a statement for insurance. I sit and visualise the rising and falling of
your chest. My cruelty heaves as I relate such undulations to thoughts.
*Note: This poem was originally commissioned and published by Running Dog in 2021 (https://rundog.art/poetry/to-be-consumed-in-something-rather-than-by-it-autumn-royal/) and the above version was reprinted in The Drama Student, Giramondo, 2023.