Poetry by Nikka Galang

     jxj CC




segmentations on desire

2000 april, sunday. ammonia flutters. acid gutters. antagonizing the air in your mouth—no not the heaves, i mean the controlled synchs that forcibly gushes from between your tongue and lips. bulldog and piss. bildungsroman like youth decays. can opener. cunt. Cassius. donkeys. dicks to fight off racism. dear sylvia. deleted or deluded. erratic illusions. either way, me, you, and the scraping of skin. flicker. fright. fanged. girlhood we never maimed. gesticulating hands, the shiver of saints. hook. hack. harpischord of guilt. incident, 2012. indent. infrequent. irreversible. jarred utterances. kundiman kay lolo. lipstick stains on cigarette butts. lacrossing the rays; no foots, no face littering the field only vomit and nails. maria leaving. narcolepsy. nape of my neck, a carving of names. nooks. occult. Orpheus’s grief. on paper. parrot feathers. quaker man. quilt. quote. queering the cathedral. reckless resenting along the sharp bends of antonio. siphoning tears. sacrilege. sin. sylvia’s words occupying the bedroom floor. taunts of parenting tactically tucked behind my ears. unrelenting. unnatural. virilic tendencies. vermillion red on my cheek. wilted and washed and nothing but more. xenophobic whirls. yonders. yearn her. zigzagging across the freeway. zoomed towards the penultimate—us, dawn, starving

                                                                                                                     [outside, my stomach loose and pried open, 
                                                                                                                     begging for a glint].

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dispatches from a minor etch

And like all the mistiness of my youth,
we were cradled by the comfort
only we could give--
 
Rubbing the powder on our gums,
eulogizing our swollen metaphors,
 
minds meandering into the forgotten
valleys of this cosmic wasteland:
 
               (a)   Like how our feeble bones trapeze
               into wistful whirls against infinite
 
               summers. Your quivering kisses still hanging
               like a web of stars above my skin. 
 
               (b)   How your hands smothered this
               delicate somberness, tracing sandy fingers,
 
               swelling against your stained flesh—my back now 
               painted with loose images of your distant cosmos. 
            
               (c) Forget our moonlit faces glaring under the sheets.
               Rebellious fucks. All homely and unsightly.
 
Remember how you carefully embossed 
your sweeping touches across my sunken body?
 
Remember how these breasts only existed 
like footnotes to your grief?

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Nikka Galang is a Sydney-based poet born in Pampanga, Philippines.
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