Handle


from the ABC set Egg

Handle

When it snapped like a neck
I thought, 'fuck',
I mean
no one was in, and she was there.

Turning round
bright and bloody,
she lay there,
like my washing
smelling of me -
me sliding down her throat
clean as warm milk,
me turning her round
and holding apart her hands like a pilgrim.

The glass in the door
slipped past like a lake
waiting to be broken
by a desperate swimmer,
and I was a desperate swimmer

singing out for air
away from the ashtray falling off the bed
my knotted hair
her hands looking so like they enjoyed themselves.

And so,
I did it.
I shouted for help
and I didn't care that she cried
and dressed quicker than I had stripped her,

I shouted until they came back
and tied a screwdriver
on to the ball of wool I let out of the window '
unpicking it
she cried,
the screws on the floor
she cried,
and leaving
I laughed long and hard
until, I had a handle
on the fact
she was never there.

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