#of mutability

[alliwanttodoiscollectpoetry]

Jo Shapcott ~ Of Mutability

Of Mutability

[ang3l-t33th]

Scorpion, from Of Mutability by Jo Shapcott.

[waxenheart]

I love it, like this, when I lose touch / with whose the voice is, whose the fingers / on the bow, the pen, whose mouth / the noise belongs to in the end.

Jo Shapcott, Shapcott’s Variation on Schoenberg’s Orchestration of Bach’s Prelude and Fugue in E♭ major, “St Anne”

[waxenheart]

Too many of the best cells in my body / are itching, feeling jagged, turning raw / in this spring chill.

Jo Shapcott, Of Mutability

[waxenheart]

I kill it because we cannot stay in the same room.

Jo Shapcott, Scorpion from Of Mutability

[waxenheart]

Don't you / want to experiment with rain, hide out in storms, / cover your body with a layer only one raindrop / thick?

Jo Shapcott, Somewhat Unravelled from Of Mutability

[saobvi]

Hairless

Por Jo Shapcott

*

Can the bald lie? The nature of the skin says not:

it’s newborn-pale, erection-tender stuff,

every thought visible – pure knowledge,

mind in action – shining through the skull.

I saw a woman, hairless absolute, cleaning.

She mopped the green floor, dusted bookshelves,

all cloth and concentration, Queen of the moon.

You can tell, with the bald, that the air

speaks to them differently, touches their heads

with exquisite expression. As she danced

her laundry dance with the motes, everything

she ever knew skittered under her scalp.

It was clear just from the texture of her head,

she was about to raise her arms to the sky;

I covered my ears as she prepared to sing, to roar.

[artisstry]

and i don't know a soul who doesn't feel small among the numbers. razor small.

of mutability, jo shapcott