Page 40 - WTP VOl. VIII #7

ChRiS VineR
Marseilles
We were 2 insects In a matchbox
Of a restaurant
The oil of the canvases Burned underneath Partitions
Of a broken city
I love you
Was like
A kind of obscure seafood
Crackling around the fossils Of salty mouths
Its oyster shells
Breaking to
Warm floods of yearning For childhood
Hunger
Sex
Obscenity
Whatever it was I needed To prick the dull meniscus Off the top of the world
And expose the organs of brutal things Those beautiful baroque canvases
For what they were.
You were it There and then Or we were
Two wild flies
Barely scrapping along Brittle scraps of cigarette Liquor
Burnt breath
Hot wood sandal embers
Almost outside ourselves
In a dirty little European town: Decomposed apple
Bitten through
A hole at the edge of the land And the last yellow stains
Of liberty
Before the great collapse.
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Viner is the author of Lemniscate (nominated for a Pushcart Award). His work has appeared in venues including Ash, Colorado Review, Critical Read, The Festival Review, and The London Magazine.
He holds degrees from Goldsmiths, University of London, and St Anne’s College, University of Oxford, where he was a recipient of the Pasby Prize for his writing. He lives in Los Angeles, CA.