Arms, legs, and everything else (a working title)

What’s Armitage when I no longer,

If the moon makes cup rings to stain the day?

If nothing’s new, and the bridges are soot,

Then why do the pigeons still coo to the sun’s self-disdain?

My writing spills code, sans siphoned cipher,

Cutting through oil with a wet, not sharp, knife,

Silence the stereo, ere static sings a lullaby,

And I’ll wake when the sun’s up at night.

What’s Armitage when I no longer?

Whose swollen eyes roll under,

When I stop trying to make amends,

And the fixtures break and bend?

Whose pathetic words spin colourful threads?

Whose intonations wake the dead?

And weave a cult with tendons—stop pretending with your gaze averted,

It’s overt, and it’s over. There’s no planning permission that this ground will cover,

There’s no station for the space you left, but the ISS,

There’s no mobile spinning around to bring you to rest,

Oh you look at those years, and you pray they’re the best,

Your jeans were too tight, but who cares how you dressed,

Now there’s nothing to mend, no one to heal, 

Dead bees in your tread that you swore out would kill,

Their honey seeps through your work boot grooves,

Left to rot beside paper cups, sodden with Absolut,

And though pollen was your guise, absence your guide,

You could never trace your steps, never apologise,

What’s Armitage, anyway, but a word that means another?

What rhymes have sake, but to spare or smother?

Why speak at all, why risk spitting to the river?

Breathe into a gust, take a breath before you slither off

And satiate the pain somehow, like a plaster on a gravestone,

Gravely going, where I will never seek to follow.

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This poem takes inspiration from other artists’ interpretations of remains, including those in songs, poetry, and prose. I also found myself drawn to themes of memory and remembrance, reflecting on how my parts might remain when I am gone. This has been weighing on me a lot recently, almost like a resurfacing of some initial existentialisms, but without the reassurance of youth. I feel old, which I know is laughable for someone in their early 20s, but I suppose I mostly feel worn down. Although resilience is a strong material to weave the body and mind, it requires a level of resistance and energy which is not always so stable. As a result, the more I find myself thriving, the less resistance I feel, alleviating the pressure while also releasing that tightly wound energy. It’s like when you’re climbing and you push up with your legs, taking the pressure off your arms while your hands shift for balance. It’s a necessary manoeuvre which requires a greater skill than grappling the holds and pulling yourself up. It also requires trust, balance, and acceptance; three things that antithesise resilience. While I understand the reality of this emotional fuse box, it doesn’t make shifting gears any easier, and it makes me fear the parts of myself which see only one solution to disengaging from a life of endurance. If I can’t control the climb, all I can do is my absolute best to stick the landing. 

Nevertheless, the speaker in this poem is deeply human, hit by the betrayal of nature, loss, isolation and failing support structures. Initially, questions of meaning are tragic because they are sought in pain.The speaker’s animosity is lost beneath the symbolism, which acts as a barrier between art and life. However, the same symbolism that hides the initial intimacy allows the passionate upheaval which casts the subject back into the speaker’s vague sorrows. Because the lens that the speaker has towards the world is ignorant of the beauty in a day moon, and it is a lens chosen out of spite towards the subject. Clarity, therefore, is returning the lens to its rightful owner,