four poems by
Siân Vate
was edward snowden
a limited hangout
it’s weird how he still says
he’d work for intelligence if they’d have him
though that could be an adaptive strategy / was
serial a limited hangout
for dishing details on cell tower data capture
& to prep the ground for the tsarnaevs / i mean
who can be bothered with all grey spots & details
after that gaslighting multi-wafered podcast plot
girls love
astrology irl & online
the cards bring us back
to our senses / actually
it’s not just girls / it’s
millennials & mums
& gays with pets
dark angels
behind each server: some machine
behind each hacker:
cup of tea
that’s hard to taste. that
can get heartbreaking in its
anonymity. are you exhausted
by other people’s privacy / angels
weeping by the cake table:
jersey funeral poker game
outside florida apartment block windows:
cute & bloodless stellar air
that i love but that’s
breathing down my laminex back
& jamming up the extreme & small
electronic lines there / we
make strong lines only
when we’re out on strike / when
harsh lines turn into info explosions &
the snapped-frozen streets in the city under
the aqua-still 2011 moon / as though
the whole purpose of occupying
without industrial demands
was just to test
the salt in the air
then get rushed by the traffic again
i mean the constabulary’s batons again
in my tram: one thousand texts
at early trades hall meetings: assange
asking not to be filmed / in belmarsh
under bright lights: assange being
filmed / filing not to be killed
the internet’s
a feeder for opps & sand is running
monument-style / all of the
time into the gaps / desert floor
you can
crack an occupied country
wide open & observe it
weep tea for its history
the sand smooths down
its pop screams into
beautiful & concentric circles
orange paper towels are clogging the drain
in our hands: the desire that i’m
being gifted & that’s
being gifted back to you
through my fingertips &
reddit-army tab: blades / enemies / canny
connective tissue
leaning onto hearts with elbows
breathing into my special screening
waking-up machine
negative miracle
thanks to mark fisher
do you ever
think about the way
stars are moving further away
& warring with the hyper-progressive
dimensional public properties
of goofy capital dreams
or
universe-as-poem / as in
exploding & also pointing to
nothing much more than itself but
stitching up dreams with colours / myth
angles & new memories
Siân Vate is a poet in Melbourne, occupied Kulin Nations country. She has published the chapbooks end motion / manifest (bulky news press) and feels right (Slow Loris).