Jean Velasco: Post Zoom Discussion

POST ZOOM DISCUSSION / END OF THE WORLD

When we finally log out, and disconnect

the shared earbuds, I am chastised for

melodrama; my latest imprudent

spin

on state and whereabouts – as if there were

a more appropriate term for necrosing flesh

than Zombie.

This is not a metaphor for numbness

I remind her, skin needs

skin to grow on,

and approximating

the edges

will take more than

photoshop

in this climate

of no telling.

When we are finally

logged out,

I call

my lover, my lover of dead things.

Not quite the twist, yet here we are:

protagonists, of our own queer horror,

tragicomedy. Gas lit by the un

hinged, neighbours, cheap tech, daylight

robbery. Each step, a glitch

of wrong red literal paper

on an off-white

scape of agar –

Where arborists spawned

a new class of dysfunction,

and the gardenless

tenants of high rises,

mysteriously,

all own shovels.

*

When she disconnects the shared

earbuds, I swear the end was better

as a Cyborg, and we nod

our human heads in reverence

to the vial on the bookshelf,

from which soap-washed pieces

shine in testament, to my once

held claim on the genre.

Of course, there must be other

augmentations. The manifesto, I never

understood. But in my dreams,

I am wielding something severed

that is live, and also rotting,

at the base. It takes two hands to bridle,

while off stage, the beast

from which

it was torn

colludes in howling

whispers.

*

On stage, my computer

does not share my fear of sleep,

uncanny spittle. Or the overflowing

currents, in the city’s metal veins.

Or the truth I know from teaching,

through a phone

already

holding its breath.

And when my pupils

fail to focus,

I make field notes through the fisheye

while trying to be objective

about their in-ear trophy canines,

& why we bother

with inversion,

& how the swab was when

the stitches

should have been,

& if I’m ageing, twice as fast,

in both time zones.

*

As we reconnect the cables,

impatient for our scene change,

each dressing

room drama

ends up

re-routed

like mail, or money, to not-fake

vermin, and empty shelves.

How the half-open parks

are a hazard, and the people

are not well.

*

In restless wings

of underfoot,

I skirt what lies

across the threshold,

avoiding

ancient

questions, like

Which organ

is best to listen to?

I want to be a poet, but

became numb, after all,

Hyperbole, too, is downplay

when it saturates the cloth

that we have nowhere

to wring out. It is only February,

and pestilence

is not a finite resource.

Jean Velasco is a writer, teacher, and translator from Naarm/Melbourne. Her work has appeared in Overland, Kill Your Darlings, Rabbit Poetry, Going Down Swinging, and the Black Inc. anthology, “Growing Up Queer in Australia”. She lives in Madrid, and can be found online @jean_sprout.