sweet disarray // like an artist

"wanna perfect body,
wanna perfect soul."
- thom yorke


maybe my soul's alright, but my body's all wrong;

i stand straight & tall even though i have a roller-coaster spine,
i cry almost every time i laugh,
i love folding blankets with others & i always drink with my pinkie out.

maybe my soul's all right;
i put away vinyls by using the sides of my palms
& tucking them briefly under my bottom lip
and i've always loved that about myself.

,
    i could have been your wisest idea,
your most loving notion;

so perhaps i will continue to hold these grudges
so that you may still occupy some space in my mind:
maybe my body's all wrong.

he touched me like an artist,
but i've never sensed weight behind brushstrokes.
he touched me like a musician,
but i'd forgotten black keys & high e strings.
he touched me like a historian:
but i'm a modernist and he's a road map.

i'm an orange peel
& you're a candy wrapper,

i'm a train ride
& you're a bike basket,

i'm frank sinatra
& you're 1977;

sometimes i still wanna wrap the sky up in a blanket
and leave it in your kitchen sink so your mother can say
she washed the dishes with her oldest friend -

so maybe my soul's alright,
but my body's all wrong:

i am the dust on your impeccable bookshelf.

\\

(manray, solarisation

circa 1929)