Mark. A Heathcote

A wingless thing, naked and caged,
watches through a keyhole
all those what-could-have-been
flowering on the other side.
...

This silence is a physical braille,
a correspondence of touch finding each word,
that completes a sentence not yet fully written.
...

I've taken you to my heart.
I've seen what's left
when the wanting is done.
One night and no more —
...

I purchased the sun
and bit into it.
Juice running down my chin and neck.
A vagabond amongst the lost
...

My eight-year-old self running through dust motes of pollen
in a field of meadow flowers, asks
what beauty is ordinary when all matter is extraordinary?
What sunsets don't need to feel regret, don't need to feel remiss,
...

Returning home then and now
One street that still nauseatingly
smells of gluhwein and diesel
And the sound of hundreds of baubles
...

Occupation: exterminator.
It wasn't meant to be a finality
It was meant to mark my first breath —
a father who fought to hold his pen
...

As long as you hold my hand
I'll be safe inside my stencil case,
I'll not be a liability,
I'll be quiet and submissive
...

Tall tales have always interested me.

Like a grandfather's stories of catching his Sunday dinner,
a goose with floating bread on a fishing line,
...

Generally, I tip the scales
and bad guys avoid looking into my kohl midnight eyes,
afraid of what they'll find there —
a scent of hibiscus, a closing flower.
...

Father, poverty is a gift
ask any bird taking a rain bath.
Son, don't make me laugh
there's nothing but rain
...

A spider's parlour is nothing without a silk negligee torn loose onto the twist pile carpet.
The room is an echo chamber — I can hear my heart, but no other sound is present.
And yet a thread is about my waist, tightening.
Once bound, I gasp,
...

Robin, robin red breast,
where's your nest?
Is it in the garden of eternal rest,
with a holly thorn against your throat?
...

I have seen what grey has done
Beyond your lounge, your wallpaper
Beyond patchwork quilts wet with tears,
marked with mascara
...

Soft as the moonlight, glinting
on a veil of silken snow
you're pale - your white beauty, maudlin.
My blood runs quick, about to overflow
...

Damask rose, how rare your beauty holds the light,
Your attar nape subdues the fears of night.
And how beautifully damask your lowly crimson cheek
Is with kisses and sunlight fed.
...

I remember the lake light shining
like a disk as I fished for perch or pike
at dusk, as I urged the fish to bite,
bite a spoon of shimmering bait.
...

So many selfies I see,
women holding their phones out to the side—
so who on earth was the photographer,
when her own arm's still in the shot?
...

When she charges her hybrid plug-in BMW,
standing there like a supermodel,
white ankle socks, a caramel knee-high dress,
tinted glasses, clutching
...

I'm as tactile as you
But only softer to touch
No whiskers on my face
Or calluses on my hands.
...