Amy Key

she at last had permission to use the marble bath for the marble bath she untied a paper bag of periwinkle bath salts & flicked them into the water as though cracking a whip she untied her hair she untidied her hair tested the water with the soft pads of her toes (tips of bladder wrack in the sun) her skin her markings (as for the bath) — interior-of-Stilton at last underwater she drew breath from every shell collected from every beach later in the evening when dressed for bed she rejoined her brothers & sister & they were each served a portion of the last portion

each  night  I  count  ghostlets  of  how  my  body  was wanted  /  behind with deadheading  /  rose hips have come  /  behind with actions that count only  /  when the  timing  is  right  /  I  took out  a contract  /  it was imprudent  in  value  /  behind  with  asepsis  /  hello microbes  of  my  body  /  we   sleep  together  /  hello cats  /  I  make  my  bed  daily  /  of the three types of hair on the sheets  /  only one is human  /  I count the bedrooms  /  I never had sex in  /  but there were cars /   wild    woods   /   blackfly    has    got   to   all   the nasturtiums  /  you cannot dig  up  a grapevine  /  and expect shelter to come  /  I am touched by  your letter /  writes  a  friend  /   you  prevaricate  desire   /   says message  /  all  this  fucking  / with  no  hands  on  me

Moisturizer is important to me like a car is important. I’ll never own a car and skin is incidentally mine. Truth is, skin seems to manage pretty well on its own. I only travel in cars to sing to the radio. My skin is such a brute! It needs a regime! I need a drink. My car and my skin need a drink. I want to say ain’t you a cool glass of water. My skin is so dull and I have no car. My eyes, however, are ritzy. I favor the non-abrasive. My cult product is an anti-aging self-emollient. More often this is new pajamas. But pajamas need multi-talents! I’m not yet old-old. Thinking of crystal decanters makes me feel young, they are inscrutable adulthood. My skin can’t be so bad — sleep is like a drink and my controls are set to bed. This is my mitigation against stress, stern weather, assorted irritations. Being ravaged is my own fault! Proper living requires routine, tiny adjustments that make life better. I’m making plans with no muscle to them. Sleep is no artificial skin, despite its gauzy potential. Rose water — by the by I’d rather drink it as the hokey pendulum swings. I’m looking for something foolproof, aplomb that withstands the interrogating nude.

1 Delphine is snug in the corruptible quiet, her heart all lurgy. She is vigorous with postures and slackening her jaw. The vogue memory is how when she was ten she stuck her tongue out really far and her friend said, “That makes you a lemon.” Retrospectively, what she wanted was a perm and a dad that gave money for the arcade. 2 Delphine lies down in the corner and gets up and lies down again, etc. This is so she knows she’s lain down on every bit of the floor. 3 There’s no one to see, so makeup is taken very seriously. If she French kisses the window her hair starts to curl — it is all very boudoir. Delphine expected to be bored. What she needs to say aloud is smooch. 4 Delphine’s heart is more woolen than sure. She nipped off the fur buds from the pussy willow and strung them into a necklace — a means of clustering wants. In the faraway land, her old milk glass holds other people’s toothbrushes and curdling water. 5 Precision here is superfluous as cut flowers. On the seafront the shrubs are meek in the blossoming wind. Delphine has worked on her complexion. Bestowed with peaches, she’s personal limelight. 6 At night her cruelties sneak up the ladder of her throat. Its delphinedelphinedelphine on steamed-up mirrors, always in joined-up finger-writing. 7 Singing is only permitted in the dark. Delphine is judging her own obedience.Look at me being strict! But she has to remind herself of the rules, hourly. Deceit is its own discipline. 8 Today the shrubs are insolent, waiting for adults to prepare a new game. Delphine considers ceremonial magic, but how to practice without a little magic escaping? 9 Wish yourself into a lovely place, she thinks. Loveliness would include shrubs without such expressions! 10 Wisdom may well have been squandered on seafronts and lipstick.So many years afraid of waste is its own waste

In the absence of anything as definitive as blood type or maths, I am delighted to declare I found the back to the earring, also the mildew is banished, albeit temporarily. I want to share this news with you, a check against the inventory of living. Personalized necklaces point to living. Customizable anything suggests it’s all worth it. Sometimes it’s “oh this iced finger bun” others it’s “put something in the diary to look forward to.” This is an elaborate mural in an ill-frequented part of the city. My diary is full and the bakery is out of buns. Indoors there needs to be a swap from idle teasels to cacti. (Some sort of permanence that works in the way I work — water, light, a finger touch confirming my edges.) I only have cats to verify I’m there. • I am building up evidence. Some bodily. Some constructed. On balance, perhaps I am more a person who racks up indicators of taste as proof of living. There are condiments, playlists, preferred linens. I first got drunk on Cinzano. There was no one taking notes. I used to dream of sex in a fully upholstered room with no windows or doors. This idea of rabbit fur rugs and buttoned velvet cushions, immaculately conceived. Always snagged on the detail of things — how even did I come to be inside, nevermind out. The sex wasn’t the point. What I seek is magic like an intact lipstick mirror in an antique handbag, my own nifty (crackerjack?) endurance. Or to discover a gulping heart within a privet hedge. Or the druzy quartz of someone’s eyes long gone and to say it! • I am dying to be written about in your diary and my self-involvement extends to endless photographs of my eye makeup, which might be described as “signature.” FYI I prefer a fine brush to a pen. What can be said about slush, about the corners cut when cleaning the fridge. What can be said about what is considered to be ordinary. Crucially, love is a desire to be a witness and be witnessed, how you might skate past the provisional.If the house were burning down I would rescue all the photographs