Life could be symmetry writhing
within the cardboard boxes
that trundle along the production line
inside the factory of sleep
or it could be thought
becoming a red curl on a black background
or the winded baby
who is born twice annually
once at each solstice
in a porcelain bathtub in Normandy
until it’s mother wins
the rights to an emotionless abortion.
Or life is a brick wall
splattered with neon red paint
beneath a flickering streetlight.
Life used to be the emptiness
amongst the crowds outside reality
whose bodies were left slumped
in office chairs or dumped
in steaming piles in town squares
or left slouching over tables in cheap cafes
or sliding naked and flabby
down the shimmering surface of stainless
steel that fills the angled space between strangers.
When I was clever life was the red dress
and black jacket combination, since then
I’ve mistaken life as
the intricate mechanics of simply being
constantly at work inside flower petals.
Life ought to be thriving deep down
below the bottom of the bottom of
the feeling of the memory of love
yet in the distance, life is the red balloon
at the centre of every black cloud,
holding it together, keeping it afloat.