Photo by 青 晨 on Unsplash

 
 
 

    CT Scan

 

When x-rayed in slices, at least an idea
of wholeness shrinks into blatant meat:
bone, blood, thickenings and masses,
shunted back and forth. Once, you smelt

how surgical holes in childish skin reduced us
to mortal. Fascinating raw depths:
but no compensation for magicʼs

release. Perhaps it creeps back on:
that fragile sac you learnt
to call yourself.

 
 
 

    On The Oxford Tube

 

Incidentals: a striplightʼs
subaqueous blues, a weak-tea winter
sky, still spattering
glass with greenish drops ‒
but that growing hush
and soporific hum
air-con and engine skin
the evening with,
are sticking plaster sounds
make on wounds outside
containment, those not visibly
weeping, between departure
and arrival.