REPOSSESSION
Down the long leg of the catwalker fishnet melts
to meshwork tobacco spittle. A black liquid garter.
Asphalt picks itself up – each scaly skin spread
between kerbstones is pulling free with a bass
pop. Every city suddenly a kicked nest of adders
coiling together into a spitting rope of pitch.
All along their spines household molecules un-
crack – hydrocarbon vertebrae whose Lego atoms
snap back into line in a chiropracty of electron-volts.
Cars at last cough up. Judder to a stop. Dig ignition-
deep to sputter swart apologies across the crisp white
shirts of their hosts. And every sump on its scrap-heap
bumps and boils its box-black kettle – rejoices openly
as through the stratosphere water-vapour and dioxide
recombine: weave fine mists of oil to drop charred
tapeworms of cirrus. Videos slime in the hand like
jumbo choc-ices. CDs in the rack pucker and shrink
to mushy black peas. Dentures gum up the works
jarred into toothless gaga. Those precise blocks
and avenues of electronics crinkle dark and
mediaeval. In the fast lane of the bowling alley
a caviar cannonball splashes ten full bottles of
devil’s milk – while those of the mobile who gas
this world down to its last nook into Porlock hell
shriek as they peel hot tar from lobes – Yes every
biro mothball racquet sags bleeds gutters
till the black string vest of tributaries resolves –
untangles towards tonsured ozone. Finally
we notice. On satellite-replays Presidents track
their sloed candyfloss economies writhing round
earth’s spindle – are caught on camera in black lip-
stick salve leaning to kiss the screen goodbye – and for
that moment the globe has a single gathering purpose
as a girl glances up from her fractions to witness
those filaments merge to a mother of twisters –
merge and rise and take her place. She watches
the whole black mass lift up and out into daytime
where it balls itself – steadies a wobbling edge
against blue to sling there its low fat circle. Crude
and glossy. She sees the birth of the full black moon
that lights our ways with dark.
