Penguins.

A woman, woven from far-fetched childhood stories,
stood at my door—Rapunzel hair bleeding into a concrete sea,
a cavernous mouth where every lie enlarged her
In her red right hand a rosy apple was gripped tight,
her glass slippers—an irritation,
they were obviously too small.
She left, unraveling a trail of string, in case we got lost.
but it was pointless—she was already turning to pixels and dust.

I sat on a brick tuffet,
ate porridge some bears had left behind,
and wondered what would become of her.
Too precious for this world, too high-maintenance,
seeking rescue from a far-off prince—while I rather liked being the frog.

My teeth, a Victorian graveyard,
tombstones yellowing, names of dead artists fading,
mourners passed by infrequently.
I half-expected Sylvia Plath and Poe’s illegitimate daughter
to hand me The Bell Jar, margins filled
with widow's ink:

"Dear Lover, I am sorry you had to leave.
Yet, I knew it was coming,
because I was leaving too.
We will remain silent beneath the trees.
We will carry on as carrion.
We will breathe in light, and last forever."

A raven arced high in the maudlin sky,
clouds unwashed, horizon unmade.
The tabby cat beside me spoke—
“We all go back to where we belong.”
His tail disappeared down the alley,
where weeds grew beautifully, blossoming yellow.

Even the ugliest of things spawn beauty every so often.
Breath became difficult.
Lungs dampened, corroded—
the inevitable was lurking.
I should have known,
but my fate was already sealed.

This is how I stumbled, quite by accident,
into the love of my life.
Through Regency squares, I walked past a toad in a top hat,
offering me a discount haircut.
What would amphibians know of hair?
His tongue lashed past me like a whip,
a fly stuck to it, swallowed whole.

Boarded-up shops littered the littered streets.
A lighting store swore,
on an infinite loop, it was closing next week.
A trap for unsuspecting tourists.
The newspaper proclaimed
A duck killer was caught on CCTV.
Who the hell was killing ducks?
Who the fuck was watching?
Who in God’s damn name set up the cameras for this kind of murder?

A pub on the corner was filled with globes.
Destinations blurred by distance.
Each one a place I might have been.

The 2CB began to settle in—
paranoia first, then serenity.
2C-B, the incestuous coupling of MDMA and LSD.
I called it the perfect crime.
No comedown, highs like stained glass,
vibrant, controllable, magical.
Once, I pissed the entire solar system from my urethra—
glistening globes floating out,
one by one,
into the ether.

Where did I want to be?
Did I really want to be HERE?
People’s faces contorted,
chins and noses hanging
by threads of sinew and time.
I shifted my weight onto my left foot,
darted into a pub,
and there she was.

Julie, perched on a barstool,
like maudlin décor hanging over the Grand Canyon.
Pregnant from the shins down.

Her first words:
"Penguins, we must stop the penguins."
She didn’t need to explain.
I understood the situation completely.

Her alabaster tongue tangled,
tripping over a rotund postman,
seemingly hellbent on delivering bad news.

Her hair, a croissant; her skin, a liver-spill
on cold white ceramic.
We'd be cemented like two proverbial bricks by the night's end.

Our one-night flight resembled more of a crime scene
than a love affair.
Flashing blue lights, cordoned-off sections,
men in suits dusting me for prints.

How many times would this scene be reenacted?
Julie had one foot in the past, the other in a taxi.
She was gone before the penguins arrived,
I was left with silence
and mottled shoes.

A spider in corduroy flares
told me I should dedicate my life
to a sanctuary for cats.
I took him deadly serious.

The penguins looked perplexed.

If all the colors I could see while on acid
were a paler shade of beige,
then what hope did I have
in the real world?