To go back is also | The lake where the boy drowned | Swim as the water touched him | it isn’t enough | How could it be? | There isn’t “enough”, that’s what eats at you | that’s how we start, always | He comes into the leaves, the grass | They lie down on towels with suns | The pressure to come back begins | the necessity to get away | He has no need of his skin anymore | drift it off, like a nightdress | and she comes, too | They put the meaning in, at night | the fridge hums | keeping one of them awake | Going back is what | holds it in place | for all your running, running, running… | And the forest is wakeful, never having slept | When they find him, it isn’t him

Thread the moon through | the glow of the pharmacy | the pleasure of white shelves | industry | passivity | Body | chemistry | The thread | slips through pharmaceutical giants | the nagging, bathetic pain | that eats very surely away | at Beethoven or Shelley | Just beyond the thread | the mystery begins | like all the streets of the city | you don’t take and | you never know | Imagine it | torrid, riotous | or secret, humid | there are certain to be opals | at some point | the feathers from tropical birds | infographics, featurettes | there will be stats | love affairs | a near-infinity | of options | colours and mink and betrayals | but one thing definitely | there will not be | is the particular shine | of the full moon | on the pharmacy’s counter | because that thread | is your thread — or so, at least, you believe | She drowns him | slowly | He coughs her | back up | There are moments of tenderness | And sometimes, when she isn’t deep | she isn’t shallow, either | she holds him down | he doesn’t even | want | to rise | Police | seek witnesses, testimony | She tries to describe | her day by the lake | but can only go forward | to the glance | where he lies | stretched out, at peace, his trunks | the colour of an olive | jettisoned | at the clear | base | of a martini | glass | and the truth | can’t be said | Quietly, the evening deepens | unvisited | virgin | wilderness | cut | altered

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from the series fleeting pixel (series of 1,000 poems, 2012–2016)
(this poem, April 2015)