Broken Things Make for Gorgeous Sculptures

I cannot stop the itching in the spaces where my fingers meet,
and this is all I can think about when a perfect
pastel gradient tries to convince me it’s over.
I know I have come to an end and I welcome it, want it, even,
but I fall deeper into where my skin chips away
like flakes of paint defeated by rust
purely because something is trying to make that decision for me.
Lacklustre birdsong fails
to punctuate the featureless blue because I have
taken it upon myself to pluck the wilting notes from the air
and store them behind my eyes until I can get the radio to work

Long ago I had a purpose, different to the one I have now.
It sits on the peripheral of my memory
under a haze of gasoline fumes and burnt rubber –
it’s there but intangible, so I am resigned to my current state,
a state I haven’t quite figured out beyond forming
an aesthetic for the enjoyment and consumption of others

Pressed against another who has found
the same emptiness spilling from within,
we pull each other too close,
we break and warp our marrowed chassis until they
sew together around each other,
we share the purpose we still don’t fully understand
as we both ignore how the gradient tries to pry us apart