Veil

I must have knitted myself

In those strange plains of sleep

Bourne with the needles

Vaccinating, the terrible teeth

Tipped with paste.

The net

Coughed from, caught on my lips

Screens my face. Adulthood

Stirs underneath

-          Then accessorised

The metal brace, grief

To educate the smile.

With fins

They wait to tickle the silver

In my eyes.

For it is hollowed, the meat

Torn away from the shell

Of the crab-curve, the cheek

Of a child’s sense of self.

The school uniform clung

Like a dressing that day

That week. Those long years

I was served to the world

As a boat

Hollow

Caught on the tide of parental desire

With a row, row, row

Yelled from the sidelines.

Short staccato strokes.

I became their vessel

Dragging the shore, against my skin

Which become the waterproofed body

Boarded by hurt, by sin.

Now 

They are giving me way to ideals

The aisles, where we start

To pick external objects

Which will constitute ‘living’

Or failing that – art.

The veil assumed a landscape

Across my legs

Crawled to stand on my spine

But I was younger then

 Now

It has dried.

Starts as a spool on the cheek

Serves to top every rib

Which they put pressure upon

The seats in the ship

And I am caught in their hands

The fingers

Still fail.  For they

Have determined a net of it

The long, stinking veil

Which glints in my stomach

Pierced with holes

As they sit either side of my chest

And throw, throw, throw.