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‘That woman deserves her revenge,’
Faced with a mouth slit to the chin by some Mexican pimp,
we were shocked, but you were undeflected.
Girl, you completely rocked when you slammed your way
out of that early grave and didn’t even smash your hand up.
We know guns and knives are not-good in the Real World;
nor are Japanese schoolgirls dandling wrecking balls,
monochrome execution scenes, kung-fu knife fights
in Pasadena or any of this dollar-bill-cool Americana.
So what? You killed us the way you killed the one you loved -
gently touching with your fingertips, exploding hearts.
From The Rialto No 65 (Summer 2008)
Vivienne Westwood, a cento
The garment should say: ‘I am this’
A story of itself
It’s just so creative to put a sentence together
Greet me by ‘how lovely you are’ rather than ‘I like your hat’
I haven’t thought properly about dying
But if I were to write anything on my tombstone
It would be ‘The only revolution is culture’
Every time I speak to someone, I assume they understand
How easy it would have been not to lead this life
I could have been a schoolteacher
What you are given for free should not be owned
Love affairs go a long way to helping life pass you by
Behave according to the clothes
Forget yourself and you will become who you are
I am the centre of my look, like Chanel was
Punk was kids having a great time, but for what? I don’t know
If I go into a room and see Pamela Anderson looking incredible
I’m going to be delighted
The sun makes my skin itch when I’m on a bicycle
A nude is never really naked
I know exactly what I would like my legacy to be
Form is always becoming something else
I design for a world that doesn’t exist, you know, one like this but better
When you stand arms warm with froth, all you see
is a wall of stone, the suggestion
of weather, dirty glass. You know your hands
will smell of leftovers, garlic and grease,
something sweet; you will not smell good enough
to eat. When the water and steel has made
you their prisoner, he will stack himself
behind you, close as a knife. He will tell
you he needs you more than food or fortune,
spoon or cup; kiss your neck like the scent
of sunlight. And you will grow fat on the way
he holds your waist, hungry as a dying man.
Until the dirty water empties itself
against the grain in a silver tide
and you can dry your ten pink fingers one
by one; take his hand and show him what
that wooden door in the stone wall is for,
broken glass, how soft the rain is as it falls.
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