social
where will we be when we win the war i bet we’ll be
alone i bet we’ll be in a laundromat with an old red sign
without any socks with only vests and pimples hair
like the 1950s freud without the wheelchair i bet
there’ll be a supermarket with cars outside
with l’oreal products all over the dashboard
there’ll be an actress playing now we’re in
the newsroom and that’s an aeroplane and
everyone’s screaming i know we’re in a video
because everyone’s dancing the hall is vomiting
and alone in the middle of it i bet you’re telling me
just how you love me i bet you’re holding me
and your arms are shaking you can’t say
anything apart from love me look i’m
pregnant sweating screaming imagine
you giving birth the movie’s over
let’s watch it again hiding behind the sofa
thinking about that time when hand in hurting
hand we held each other in the middle of the
road when we sunk into the tarmac when
mouth full of concrete the truck came with
its eyes like headlights hollering whispering
i want you you’re secret secreting into me i
hurt you you tell me you love me probably
there’s a child in a room in kosovo
somewhere there’s a child next to this child
with a mobile phone there’s sirens playing
a bomb went off it’s beautiful you jump right
off it’s beautiful the waves are crashing yes
someone’s singing i watch these videos every
day it was always supposed to be this way
i bet there’s no one watching us we jump
remember where we were when we won the war
when we walked right down the street there was no
smoke there was no sound no one else even knew
we had our t-shirts on the ones that said we won
we went to that bit in the city where we first made
love i took you i touched you i fucked you you came
we bought popcorn we sat and watched the day go
by you look just like your mother you curdle like milk
you know i’ve got a button i can press and you glow
the building crumbles at the knees it falls like a dancer
it folds we hold it all the other buildings look on
this building’s ours we are so naked and we cradle
it you have a spot below your armpit you have a
scar where no one can see your secret’s safe
with me let’s go the movie’s over now
wednesday
Time is really long 🙁
time is like a thing
it adds an air of mystery to an otherwise dull day
You can’t remember things before you’re six because no conception of identity.
Memory linked to identity.
Depressed people don’t remember happy times.
At least not specifically.
tend to be too vague
Harry Burke is a writer based in London. He has written for Arcadia Missa Publications, Mute Magazine and rhizome.org. His poetry has been published in Clinic III, Stop Sharpening Your Knives 5 and Best British Poetry 2013. He is currently editing a poetry anthology for Test Centre, due in early 2014.
