some where we stay,

a collective bruise,

a team, a time spent

together, a

choreographic

spell, a prefatory

charm, a sensation

that nothing that

comes out of my

mouth, fingers,

keyboard, mother

tongue, language, 

is mine 

 

 

 

some where along the 

lines i rest between 

your tongues, 

plant dances 

where perfume meets

your smell 

of a skin of a tongue

i fall i slip

in the sleep of your 

tongue

around my languages

 

please fold your time 

slowly near me

 

unfixing, dislocating, 

disowning 

the dances-words-

thoughts-tongues borrowers 

slid swords into words 

into libraries

owing to one another 

all the time 

borrowing words-

thoughts as we are 

dances, re-flexing our 

muscle tones

 

this language is not 

mine 

i bit my tongue, which 

is not mine

it’s a mother’s language 

says

 

how i love the mutual 

indebtedness that is not 

about paying one 

another back, but about 

enjoying that dependance, listening 

to the ghosts –our 

proteXtions– in the 

paddings, quilts, of our 

shady studies

 

jumping off board

surfing sofas, texts, 

annotations and their 

arrangements as many 

vehicles, conveyors of

senses –as in senses

leaving the littorals

our literal translations

leaving the ship [a 

pause for the word ship. 

The break it asks to 

think of a ship.]

 

this language is not 

mine

it’s motherless 

I bit my tongue

i bite your tongue

it’s a mother’s 

language says

 

hay-feverish, jay-

feverishly tip-tonguing,

the glitchiness unfolds 

as if declining 

language itself and what 

evidence it contains


tongue inside out, 

still firmly around and 

smiling at the many 

years since the caress

a voice leaks down 

under my feet

drips in reverse in my 

mouth and sings no 

songs in my arms

 

no thing that comes out 

of my mouths, fingers, 

keyboard is mine

the things that sit under 

the folded seats of 

theatre venues - les 

strapontins de nos 

allées et venues au 

théâtre


striking a text in 

brushed aside 

footnotes, cultivating 

cult notes 

resting in forces that 

already exist

listening to the voices

trickling down the 

inside of my clothes, my 

bed-sheet the inside of 

my arms

 

the smell of wet pepper 

corns lightly crushed, 

rising from the bed in the 

light splash. this 

smell

 

tongue inside out, 

firmly around and 

smiling at the many 

years since the caress

 

and the voices that 

don’t stop falling 

bumping on to familiar 

patterns on the floor, 

skirting the old stain

taking a collection of 

words in their wake

they leak down under 

my feet, drip in reverse 

in my mouth

and sing no songs in 

my arms

 


written in the company of Anne Boyer, Paula Caspão, Avery F. Gordon, Mirene Arsanios, Valentina Desideri, Fred Moten, Laura Vazquez & many others.

 

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