mariaology

☾

Claire de Luna
For Alex

Just found a sequin in my cup of tea
now stuck to the organ
grinding medicine of the morning 
after Claire de Luna declares it 
licking the inside shot
of tequila 
like antediluvians
lining the seabed with SSRIs
did somebody say “free margaritas”
I want to love the salt-rimming margins 
of reading the poem 
liquefied drunk lilac of loving

Smashed the disco piñata of my brain 
just to feel something
logistical about happiness
Blake says “eternity is in love
with the productions of time”
which is why we celebrate birthdays
for age verification under the name
of human nature 
like nobody puts baby on the carousel
ouch, taking half of the pill you are
horse girl summer.

*

Nobody at the wedding was on their phone.
I think we should get married more often,
why not do it over and over
licensed a la carte of loving 
lightning bolts 
drawn on James
that’s how it starts
surrendering mood to the iPod shuffle of the noughties 
what monoculture still plays in thine ears is radio
weight like watching your life salve 
lip-syncing grace of plenitude
tattooed on our ankles
tomorrow I travel 499 miles to witness 
meltwater
come into song.

Julia Cameron says god has a lot of money.
Did Kanye read The Artist’s Way?
Junk bond celestine of autumn goldenness
doesn’t glow like it used to, cash in my pocket
starts to burn ecological moonlighting ruins
on the basis of cigarettes in process
light nutrient water recycling
boosts the release of serotonin from the pre-
synaptic cell party hiya
stuffed pistachio cookie ether,
either way. Drink up baby.

I’m so in love with my friends 
it might become a problem
doing star jumps to 
‘Sugar We’re Going Down’ 
like holding sparklers too close
to the sky, they start 
to think they’re shooting stars.

*

Alex is a gender-neutral name of Greek origin
meaning “defender of humankind”
which is why they sent you to fuck
the anthropocene so hard it turns
to seafoam. 

O God of Wine
lush chromosomes of sleep adequacy 
fill my eyelids with orange
dreamt sexuality of star speak
Yasi is reading Kierkegaard and I’m crying finally
alien pixels of being dumb
emotional girl clutter
surfing the internet permafrost 
people called me a living sim 
supervised by Anna Tsing
I was salon assistant to the 
sadness device 
of forest massage.

It cost so much to let go 
of her leaving.

*

The apocalypse is stylised polyester.
You are wearing a dress of flame and
burning up that slay would leave no
fire behind you, white
hot praxis 
rats with necklaces
of satellite dishes
beam me up softly
to want Carhartt durable 
rent stabilised limbo
of being a work in progress 
touched luminous thot
climbing the ladder charisma

I was told a wild case of golden goose 
bumps a literal golden goose
prone to memorising pop songs
buying shares in Ethereum
stomach pain from the ice crush
of so many bruises.

*

Still going strong in the life morning 
beautiful four-leaf lovers
queen of the lit department
trying to learn 
Luna checking the pee mail of the neighbourhood canines:
Bruce woz ere,
Peanut sayz hi 
I ❤ Keats etc.

*

I mean the kind of snack that happens
upon you, loves you back
happy birthday
foreverie golden surrounds 
finish the cookie to keep the peace
trebuchet of personality
the shape of how I love them is inexplicable 
like math fruit of loving itself 
Cinderace soccer ball of kicking fire 
up in car headlights just to write this
adrenaline voice note 
of Caroline’s hopedrunk everlasting encore 
volcano of yasssified gender

our bar in Berlin translates as 
COMRADE
NEST 3000
playing disco vintage of parataxis 
like putting the word ‘no’ in a poem
as if to image the jagged edge of 
snowflakes snagged in my 
curriculum vitae of oesophageal 
rupture like
hi, a career.

I’ll add that 
to the ADHD craft graveyard 
of my personal sabotage
email embroidery
flavour of the meadow 
we’re in for a bit.
I like having a reason
to be a little 
invisible
dabbing the blue idea 
of what you said 
people should 
scunnersome
boycott
the grade device until they realise
intelligence is weather dependent.

*

I was my own sister
kissed forehead 
a server farm
of purloined bog myrtle
from which 
distress is the same 
gaping brilliantly not 
like a wound just a knot
in a tree made of cloud
as you said of 
ceremony’s gigabyte largesse
gone into orb 
tomorrow
wear something comfortable
and look HOT
out in the plasmatron 
reality holism. 

*

Happy birthday, but like
in four-dimensional waltz time
trying my altitude regret
I stay really high in the hero stage
doing Barbie parkour 
while someone smokes
blunts out the infra-
twilight of being alive
with y’all so much 
spinning around 
flowers in the 
pouring rain
getting lit
lit, lit, lit:
let them 
eat chips.

— September 2023