xiii

sweet, yearning, pathetic princess
your gentle need, overflow in excess
compulsive schizoid, lover’s shell
promise kindness but exempt yourself
you miss the bite barks and the burn
replicate the ache you so wish to earn
perversion sickness, suffocate the urge
to spoil yourself in all the sin you deserve

so you want happiness still?
or does violence call your name too sweetly?
intruded upon by murder fantasies
beyond the repair of poetry
your teeth rest in porcelain
pooled in grime and piss
empty train station limbo
liminal spaces where safety cannot exist

existence in poetry //

transgender,
hopeless sapphic
gothic romantic //

revelations in love,
despair, hope
failure, beauty
death, personhood
resistance, healing //

non-indigenous woman
dwelling in Naarm
on lands sovereign
to the Wurundjeri people
this always was
always will be
Aboriginal land
paytherent.net.au //