StylusLit

March 2017

Back to Issue 1

Aerial

By Stuart Barnes

They are the true punks, darkness-

shoved onto this blue,

intractable plaque. Distances

 

rouse, High Priestess- 

like. Eucalyptus forks grow. 

Kree and beak-furrow. 

 

I press stiff little fingers to                         

brows. More angelic upstarts arc

through steaminess, catch

 

my jigger-eye,

summoning dark

spirits. Hooks                        

 

seldom hidden revolve. Mouthfuls

of seed. A beastie-boy’s shadows.                        

The homosexuals somewhere else. 

 

Voices on the air. 

Claws dissolve hair, 

clothing, heels. 

 

Liberty-spiked, white                        

cousins merely half-unpeel

queer stringencies.                                     

 

Misfits, he and I

dragged the Atlantic—sea’s

ivory, sea’s gilt. An undivided cry—

 

the damned wall

tilts, I                         

against I, time’s arrow

 

tapers and flies,

the rivals, we drive 

abrasive wheels, black flag’s red 

 

knuckle dusting the mourning. 

 

 

 

note: a terminal from Sylvia Plath’s ‘Ariel’